Low-Level Radioactive Waste: Status of Disposal Availability in the United States and Other Countries
Released: 2008-05-20T00:00:00

Letter

Background

The disposal of LLRW is the end of the radioactive material lifecycle that spans production, use, processing, interim storage, and disposal. The nuclear utility industry generates the bulk of this LLRW through the normal operation and maintenance of nuclear power plants, and through the decommissioning of these plants. Other LLRW is generated from medical, industrial, agricultural, and research applications. Common uses of radioactive material are in radiotherapy, radiography, smoke detectors, irradiation and sterilization of food and materials, measuring devices, and illumination of emergency exit signs. In the course of working with these radioactive materials, other material, such as protective clothing and gloves, pipes, filters, and concrete, that come in contact with them will become contaminated and therefore need to be disposed of as LLRW.

In the 1960s, the Atomic Energy Commission, a predecessor agency to DOE, began to encourage the development of commercial LLRW disposal facilities to accommodate the increased volume of commercial waste that was being generated. Six such disposal facilities were licensed, two of which, the Richland facility, licensed in 1965, and the Barnwell facility, licensed in 1969, remain today. Each of these facilities is located within the boundaries of or adjacent to a much larger site owned by DOE. The third facility, in Clive, Utah, operated by EnergySolutions (formerly known as Envirocare of Utah), was originally licensed by the state of Utah in 1988 to only accept naturally occurring radioactive waste. In 1991, Utah amended the facility’s license to permit the disposal of some LLRW, and the Northwest Compact agreed to allow the facility to accept these wastes from noncompact states. By 2001, the facility was allowed to accept all types of class A waste.

The United States Currently Has Available Disposal Capacity for Most Domestically Produced LLRW

At this time, sufficient available disposal capacity exists for almost all LLRW. However, fast-approaching constraints on the availability of disposal capacity for class B and class C wastes could adversely affect the disposal of many states’ LLRW. Specifically, beginning on June 30, 2008, waste generators in 36 states will be precluded from using the Barnwell disposal facility for their class B and class C LLRW. That facility currently accepts about 99 percent of the nation’s class B and class C commercial LLRW. Although the Barnwell and Richland facilities have more than sufficient capacity to serve waste generators from the 14 states that are members of the facilities’ respective compacts until at least 2050, the remaining 36 states will have no disposal options for their class B and class C LLRW.

Although waste generators in these 36 states will no longer have access to Barnwell, they can continue to minimize waste generation, process waste into safer forms, and store waste pending the development of additional disposal options. While NRC prefers the disposal of LLRW, it allows on- site storage as long as the waste remains safe and secure. Since September 11, 2001, both the public’s concern with, and its perception of, risk associated with radioactive release, including that from stored LLRW, have increased. However, should an immediate and serious threat come from any specific location of stored waste, NRC has the authority under the act to override any compact restrictions and allow shipment of the waste to a regional or other nonfederal disposal facility under narrowly defined conditions. Waste minimization techniques and storage can alleviate the need for disposal capacity, but they can be costly. For example, in June 2004 we reported that one university built a $12 million combined hazardous and radioactive waste management facility. Two-thirds of this facility is devoted to the processing and temporary storage of class A waste.

Additional disposal capacity for the estimated 20,000 to 25,000 cubic feet of class B and class C LLRW disposed of annually at Barnwell may become available with the opening of a new disposal facility in Texas. This facility has received a draft license and appears to be on schedule to begin operations in 2010. Although the facility may accept some DOE cleanup waste, there is presently no indication that it will be made available to all waste generators beyond the two states that are members of the Texas Compact (Texas and Vermont).

In contrast, available disposal capacity for the nation’s class A waste does not appear to be a problem in either the short or long term. Our June 2004 report noted that EnergySolutions’ Clive facility had sufficient disposal capacity, based upon then-projected disposal volumes, to accept class A waste for at least 20 years under its current license. This facility currently accepts about 99 percent of the nation’s class A LLRW. Since our report was issued, domestic class A waste has declined from about 15.5 million cubic feet in 2005 to about 5 million cubic feet in 2007. This decline is primarily attributed to DOE’s completion of several cleanup projects. DOE waste constituted about 50 percent of the total waste accepted by EnergySolutions in 2007. This reduction in projected class A disposal volumes will extend the amount of time the Clive facility can accept class A waste before exhausting its capacity. According to the disposal operator, capacity for this facility has been extended another 13 years, to 33 years of capacity.

It is important to note, however, that our June 2004 analysis of available LLRW disposal capacity considered only domestically produced LLRW. We did not consider the impact of imported LLRW on available class A, B, and C disposal capacity at Clive, Barnwell, and Richland. Although disposal capacity at the time of our June 2004 report appeared adequate using then- projected waste disposal volumes, the impact of adding additional waste from overseas waste generators is unclear.

Most Foreign Countries Either Have Available LLRW Disposal Capacity or Plan to Develop It

While none of the foreign countries we surveyed for our March 2007 report indicated that they have disposal options for all of their LLRW, almost all either had disposal capacity for their lower-activity LLRW or central storage facilities for their higher-activity LLRW, pending the availability of disposal capacity. Specifically, we surveyed 18 foreign countries that previously had or currently have operating nuclear power plants or research reactors. Ten of the 18 countries reported having available disposal capacity for their lower-activity LLRW and 6 other countries have plans to build such facilities. Only 3 countries indicated that they have a disposal option for some higher-activity LLRW. Many countries that lack disposal capacity for LLRW provide centralized storage facilities to relieve waste generators of the need to store LLRW on-site. Specifically, 7 of the 8 countries without disposal facilities for lower-activity LLRW had centralized storage facilities. Eleven of the 15 countries without disposal facilities for at least some higher-activity LLRW provide central storage facilities for this material.

Of the 18 countries we surveyed, only Italy indicated that it lacked disposal availability for both lower- and higher-activity LLRW and central storage facilities for this waste. As reported by Italy to the international Nuclear Energy Agency, in 1999, the government began to develop a strategy for managing the liabilities resulting from the country’s past national nuclear activities. The strategy established a new national company to shut down all of Italy’s nuclear power plants and to promptly decommission them. It also created a national agency that would establish and operate a disposal site for radioactive waste. A subsequent government decree in 2001 prompted an acceleration of the process to select a disposal site, with the site to begin operations in 2010. However, the Italian government has more recently reported it has encountered substantial difficulties establishing a disposal site because local governments have rejected potential site locations. In total, Italy will have an estimated 1.1 million cubic feet of lower-activity LLRW that will result from decommissioning its nuclear facilities in addition to the 829,000 cubic feet of this waste already in storage.

Our March 2007 report identified several management approaches used in foreign countries that, if adopted in the United States, could improve the management of radioactive waste. These approaches included, among other things, using a comprehensive national radioactive waste inventory of all types of radioactive waste by volume, location, and waste generator; providing disposition options for all types of LLRW or providing central storage options for higher-radioactivity LLRW if disposal options are unavailable; and developing financial assurance requirements for all waste generators to reduce government disposition costs.

We also identified another management approach used in most countries—national radioactive waste management plans—that also might provide lessons for managing U.S. radioactive waste. Currently, the United States does not have a national radioactive waste management plan and does not have a single federal agency or other organization responsible for coordinating LLRW stakeholder groups to develop such a plan. Such a plan for the United States could integrate the various radioactive waste management programs at the federal and state levels into a single source document.

Our March 2007 report recommended that DOE and NRC evaluate and report to the Congress on the usefulness of adopting the LLRW management approaches used in foreign countries and developing a U.S. radioactive waste management plan. Although both agencies generally agreed with our recommendations, NRC, on behalf of itself and DOE, subsequently rejected two approaches that our March 2007 report discussed. Specifically, NRC believes that the development of national LLRW inventories and a national waste management plan would be of limited use in the United States. In a March 2008 letter to GAO on the actions NRC has taken in response to GAO’s recommendations, NRC stated that the approach used in the United States is fundamentally different from other countries. In particular, NRC argued that, because responsibility for LLRW disposal is placed with the states, the federal government’s role in developing options for managing and/or disposing of LLRW is limited. NRC also expressed concern about the usefulness and significant resources required to develop and implement national inventories and management plans.

We continue to believe comprehensive inventories and a national plan would be useful. A comprehensive national radioactive waste inventory would allow LLRW stakeholders to forecast waste volumes and to plan for future disposal capacity requirements. Moreover, a national radioactive waste management plan could assist those interested in radioactive waste management to identify waste quantities and locations, plan for future storage and disposal development, identify research and development opportunities, and assess the need for regulatory or legislative actions. For example, there are no national contingency plans, other than allowing LLRW storage at waste generator sites, to address the impending closure of the Barnwell facility to class B and class C LLRW from noncompact states. The availability of a national plan and periodic reporting on waste conditions might also provide the Congress and the public with a more accessible means for monitoring the management of radioactive waste and provide a mechanism to build greater public trust in the management of these wastes in the United States.

Mr. Chairman, this concludes my prepared statement. I would be happy to respond to any questions that you or Members of the Committee may have at this time.

GAO Contact and Staff Acknowledgements

Contact points for our Offices of Congressional Relations and Public Affairs may be found on the last page of this testimony. For further information about this testimony, please contact Gene Aloise at (202) 512- 3841 or aloisee@gao.gov. Major contributors to this statement were Daniel Feehan (Assistant Director), Thomas Laetz, Lesley Rinner, and Carol Herrnstadt Shulman.

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