The Vermont Nuclear Decommissioning Citizens Advisory Panel held two meetings this month to discuss federal waste policy and receive an update on the decommissioning of the former Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Plant.
The Nuclear Waste Policy committee of the advisory panel met December 2nd to review the annual reports of the Federal Nuclear Waste Policy committee panel and to hear an overview from Lissa Weinmann on the radioactive waste summit she attended in June. Vice Chair of the Citizens Advisory Panel and chair of its Federal Nuclear Waste Policy committee, she noted it was the first time a member of the Vermont panel had attended.
“There was a lot of overlap between discussions about the defense waste and the discussions of the civilian nuclear waste, which are treated as really two separate streams,” said Weinmann. “And for instance we talk about Yucca Mountain. That’s just been for civilian nuclear waste. It was interesting to note that that was only licensed for 60 tons, apparently. And we currently have about 130 tons. You know we’ve been talking about the one geologic repository that we need. But in fact even if Yucca was to open it probably couldn’t accommodate all the waste we’ve generated so far.”
During the December 9th meeting of the full advisory panel NorthStar Senior Decommissioning Manager Corey Daniels provided an update on the decommissioning and dismantling of the Vermont Nuclear Power Plant. He told the panel the reactor building is the last major structure that remains standing and the company remains on track to complete decommissioning in all areas before the 2030 target.
“We’ve really been focusing our energies on decontaminating and cleaning out that reactor building in preparations for open air demo. But year-to-date we’ve met our target goals. There’s really just nothing left that’s of significance with radiological. The good news is work got done safe,” reported Daniels. “We haven’t hurt anybody. No one’s been overexposed and it’s all gone except for the fuel, of course, that’s stored in dry storage on the pad and the greater than Class C waste. So, pretty good success story from a radiological standpoint and we will continue to make that happen safely. There’s not a lot to show you but empty rooms in a building that’s about to be torn down and we’re still on track to make that happen early into next year.”
Every year the Vermont governor and legislature receive a report from the panel on their activities over the year. Weinmann noted that the draft report is on the decommissioning panel’s website
“I think the most useful information in the annual report is actually at the end of the report and that sort of has summaries of major activities that have taken place in the year, decommissioning trust fund balances over time, significant site changes, all kinds of amounts of radioactive waste shipments, summaries of water management and water shipments which I know has been of a great deal of interest to other folks at Pilgrim and other reactors. So all of that is there,” Weinmann said.
The full Vermont Nuclear Decommissioning Citizens Advisory Panel discussed setting their three mandatory meetings for the upcoming year and also elected the panel’s officers for 2025.
