Interim Storage / NRC Issues Draft Environmental Impact Statement For Holtec Facility In New Mexico

As reported by NucNet.

NRC DEIS for Holtec CISF, NM is out; demand more public comment meetings & deadline extension!

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) has published the Draft Environmental Impact Statement (DEIS) for the Holtec International/Eddy-Lea Energy Alliance irradiated nuclear fuel consolidated interim storage facility (CISF) in New Mexico. See the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) press release, linked here. And see the 488-page NRC DEIS linked here. It is entitled NUREG-2237 DFC, "Environmental Impact Statement for the (sic) Holtec International's License Application for a Consolidated Interim Storage Facility for Spent Nuclear Fuel and High Level Waste." The executive summary is 40 pages long; it is linked here.

NRC has granted only 60 days for public comment, as compared to the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) 199 days for the proposed Yucca Mountain, Nevada dump-site -- targeted at Western Shoshone land -- at the same DEIS stage in 1999 to 2000. But Holtec's CISF proposal is actually 2.5 times larger than Yucca, 173,600 metric tons of irradiated nuclear fuel versus 70,000 MT. Thus, Holtec's transport volume, risks, and impacts will be 2.5 times worse than Yucca's! (See Yucca-bound routes and volumes, here.) Despite this, NRC has yet again given very short shrift to transport, complicit with Holtec in keeping routes largely secret. Remarkably, NRC seems to have provided even less information than Holtec did in its 2018 Environmental Report. Holtec provided a single transport route map (see image, above left; see a legible version, posted online here), accounting for only four (three at San Onofre, CA; one at Maine Yankee) of the around 119 atomic reactor origin points for shipments. What about the other 115?! Outrageously, Holtec and NRC are trying to keep the public in the dark about the CISF scheme's large transport impacts, including on Environmental Justice!

In addition, NRC has scheduled only five public comment meetings, exclusively in New Mexico (April 14, Roswell; April 15, Hobbs; April 16, Carlsbad; Albuquerque, May 5; Gallup, May 6). But DOE held 24 public comment meetings, not just in Nevada, but in a dozen more states along transport routes nationwide, during Yucca's DEIS stage. Truth be told, Holtec's CISF transport risks will impact most states in the Lower 48, just like Yucca would, only the information is being kept secret, an unacceptable violation of the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA; see a coalition letter, sent by attorney Terry Lodge on behalf of a coalition of more than 50 groups, including Beyond Nuclear, to the White House Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ), in defense of NEPA, opposing the Trump administration's proposed gutting; Lodge also serves as legal counsel for Don't Waste Michigan, et al., a seven-group coalition opposed to Holtec's CISF)!  

 

Please contact your U.S. Representative, and both your U.S. Senators. Urge them to demand that NRC hold a public comment meeting in your congressional district/state. Also urge that they demand NRC extend the public comment period to 199 days. You can phone your Congress Members' D.C. offices via the U.S. Capitol Switchboard at (202) 224-3121.

 

Re: NRC's DEIS, Beyond Nuclear will write sample comments you can use to submit your own, ASAP. Learn more about the environmental injustice of the proposed CISFs (including Interim Storage Partners' at Waste Control Specialists in west Texas, just 39 miles from Holtec's in NM) at our Centralized Storage website section. (The publication of NRC's DEIS for the ISP/WCS CISF can be expected in about six weeks, as well.)

Nuclear waste storage facility near Carlsbad gets federal approval, despite concerns

As reported by the Carlsbad Current Argus.

Plan to store nuke fuel in New Mexico gets 1st regulatory OK

Reported by AP, reprinted in the San Luis Obispo, CA Tribune.

Ironically, the SLO Tribune neglected to mention that SLO Mothers for Peace is an official intervenor opposed to the Holtec CISF. SLOMPF is one of seven grassroots environmental groups in the Don't Waste Michigan et al. coalition, represented by attorney Terry Lodge of Toledo, OH.

Holtec clears hurdle in bid to build nuclear-waste facility in New Mexico

As reported by the Cherry Hill Courier-Post.

Cherry Hill, NJ, a suburb of Philadelphia, PA, has long been a headquarters for Holtec International's radioactive waste-focused schemes.

The article quotes Beyond Nuclear's radioactive waste specialist, Kevin Kamps:

But the NRC's stance will only stiffen opposition to Holtec's plan, said Kevin Kamps of Beyond Nuclear, a Maryland-based advocacy group that is part of an environmental coalition fighting the project.

"It's just a matter of redoubling our efforts," said Kamps, who noted the project's foes are currently appealing an earlier decision in Holtec's favor by the NRC's Atomic Safety and Licensing Board.

"I think more and more people in this country are realizing this company can't be trusted," he said of Holtec.

Critics previously have expressed concern over the possible release of radioactivity from the canisters and the risks of transporting nuclear waste to the remote facility.

Critics also contend Holtec's facility, although described as an "interim" storage site, could become a permanent fixture.

Kamps predicted the fight over the project could end up in court, because critics contend any license granted by the NRC would violate federal law.