Beyond Nuclear public comment #8, re: NRC's Holtec/ELEA CISF DEIS, Docket ID NRC-2018-0052 -- re: the license for Private Fuel Storage, LLC, CISF -- targeted at Skull Valley Goshutes Indian Reservation in Utah -- is not terminated, contradicting NRC Staff assertions to the contrary

Submitted via: <holtec-cisfeis@nrc.gov>

Dear NRC Staff,

A colleague has spotted a significant error in the Overview attached to both the Holtec and the ISP/WCS NRC DEIS documents (ISP/WCS is a second CISF, targeted at west Texas, just 39 miles from Holtec's CISF in NM, according to Holtec's CEO, Krishna Singh):

Don Hancock of Southwest Research and Information Center (SRIC) in Albuquerque, NM has pointed out:

"The Overview (like the Holtec one) again repeats the factual error that PFS's [Private Fuel Storage, LLC] license is terminated (page 4)."

Here is the false statement, as printed in NRC's Overview:

"The NRC previously licensed one other away-from-reactor dry cask spent fuel storage facility, called Private Fuel Storage (NUREG-1714); however, that facility was never built and the license was subsequently terminated." (emphasis added) 

This is not true. The license was not subsequently terminated.

Thus, NRC's CISF DEIS Overviews, re: both the Holtec/ELEA and the ISP/WCS CISFs, are inaccurate as to NRC's own licensing decisions.

NRC made the same mistake in its Holtec/ELEA NM CISF DEIS summary/overview, first published on March 10, 2020, as it also has done in its ISP/WCS TX CISF DEIS summary/overview.

And the DEIS documents themselves do not state that the PFS license is terminated. So in that sense, the summaries/overviews contradict the DEIS documents, as well.

Significantly, if Holtec International/Eddy-Lea Energy Alliance, Interim Storage Partners/Waste Control Specialists, and the nuclear power utilities, were serious about these CISFs being entirely private, then why not use the license already rubber-stamped by NRC at PFS more than a decade ago? Why seek news CISF licenses at Holtec/ELEA in NM, and at ISP/WCS in TX? Because the actual goal is to transfer title/ownership, and liability, onto the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) -- that is, federal taxpayers. Which is illegal, a violation of the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982, as Amended. This illegality is at the heart of Beyond Nuclear's lawsuit against both CISFs. Don't Waste MI et al. (a seven-group national grassroots environmental coalition), Sierra Club, and Fasken Oil and Ranch, have also challenged this violation of the NWPA represented by these CISF schemes, and NRC's complicity in them, in violation of federal laws like the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982, as Amended, and the Administrative Procedure Act.

Not that Beyond Nuclear and our environmental and environmental justice allies think the PFS CISF targeting the Skull Valley Goshutes was or is a good idea. Quite the opposite. It was and is a dangerously bad idea, and an outrageous violation of environmental justice. Learn more about the environmental movement's successful resistance to the PFS CISF, a victory won in close solidarity and collaboration with Native American partners, including Skull Valley Goshute dump opponents Margene Bullcreek and Sammy Blackbear, Indigenous Environmental Network, Honor the Earth, and others, posted online at this link: <http://archives.nirs.us/radwaste/scullvalley/skullvalley.htm>.

The following documentation shows that the PFS license was never terminated, as NRC Staff have falsely stated in their CISF DEIS Overviews:

PFS / NRC - Withdrawal Of License Termination Request.

ML14255A395

https://adamswebsearch2.nrc.gov/webSearch2/main.jsp?AccessionNumber=ML14255A395 

Document Title:	Withdrawal of Termination Request of NRC licence SNM-2513 for Private Fuel Storage, LLC.
Document Type:	Letter
Document Date:	09/12/2014

ML14265A030

https://adamswebsearch2.nrc.gov/webSearch2/main.jsp?AccessionNumber=ML14265A030 

Document Title:	Letter To R. M. Palmberg re: Withdrawal Of License Termination Request.
Document Type:	Letter
Document Date:	09/18/2014

Such glaring NRC Staff errors must be corrected in the Holtec/ELEA, as well as the ISP/WCS, CISF DEIS documentation packages, including the erroneous Overviews.

These comments are submitted on behalf of Beyond Nuclear's members and supporters in NM, TX, and across the U.S. along impacted transport routes.

Please acknowledge receipt of these comments. Thank you.