Washington, DC – By a 5-0 vote, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) has rejected a rulemaking proposal by its staff that would have permitted radioactive waste to be dumped in municipal landfills, used in roadbeds, and recycled into consumer products. The turnaround was all the more remarkable because the Commissioners themselves had earlier strongly directed staff to prepare the waste deregulation rulemaking in the first place.
Environmentalists cautiously praised the decision. “The NRC clearly backed down from this crazy idea because it recognized the firestorm of public concern that would be triggered,” said Daniel Hirsch, President of the Los Angeles-based Committee to Bridge the Gap (CBG) that has fought such radioactive deregulation proposals for years. “The public doesn’t want radioactive waste in their local garbage dump, children’s braces, or tools.”
“This is an important victory for public health and environmental protection,” stated Diane D’Arrigo of Nuclear Information and Resource Service (NIRS), “although possibly temporary since some commissioners want to proceed with it AFTER new nuclear reactors are licensed. Maybe they don’t want the public to realize new nuclear reactors means nuclear waste that could end up in our kids’ toys and other everyday items. The NRC should be on notice, however: Don’t even think of trying this again. We’ll remain vigilant.”
In 1986 and 1990, the NRC tried a similar deregulation plan, called “Below Regulatory Concern” (BRC). It would similarly have permitted radioactive waste to go to unlicensed landfills, contaminated metals and other materials to be recycled into consumer products, and other wastes to avoid having to go to radioactive waste disposal facilities licensed and designed for that purpose. The BRC Policies created widespread public opposition, media coverage and legislation in numerous states. In 1992 Congress intervened and overturned the NRC’s radioactive waste deregulation policies.
In 2002 the Commissioners directed NRC staff to prepare a new regulation releasing significant volumes of radioactive wastes from the requirement that they be disposed of in licensed radioactive waste facilities. In March 2005 the proposed regulation was sent to the Commission for approval. Numerous environmental groups weighed in opposing it as a revival of the discredited BRC Policy. This week, the Commissioners unanimously rejected the proposed regulation. They did, however, hold out the prospect of possibly reviving it at some time in the future”two, five, or ten years from now” according to one Commissioner.
The NRC will, however, continue to release nuclear waste under its current case-by-case exemption procedures, which are not readily open to public notice, comment or intervention. Opposition from the public and state officials recently forced the cancellation of shipments of reactor decommissioning wastes to unlicensed waste sites in Idaho and Texas that NRC staff had quietly approved using the exemption process.
“While we are pleased that the Commissioners are not moving forward with this ill-begotten proposal, we remain concerned about the so-called ‘case-by-case’ releases that are occurring today,” said Wenonah Hauter, director of the Energy Program at Public Citizen. “No releases of radioactively contaminated materials should be allowed for reuse, recycling, or disposal into municipal landfills. The NRC should make public information about the releases that have occurred thus far.”
“This decision is a major step in the right direction but it is tempered by the NRC’s recent deregulation of nuclear materials in transport,” D’Arrigo continued, pointing out that “NRC, with the US Department of Transportation has approved some of the very same exemptions in the 2004 radioactive transport regulations. NIRS, CBG and Public Citizen are among a group of organizations now challenging the both agencies in federal court for the transport exemptions.