The US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) requires nuclear power reactor licensees to maintain decommissioning cost estimates and to adjust those estimates periodically to account for inflation and other matters, pursuant to Title 10 of the Code of Federal Regulations (10 CFR) 50.75, “Reporting and Recordkeeping for Decommissioning Planning.” These periodic updates must consider various factors, including: (1) increased labor costs; (2) increased energy costs; and (3) increased waste burial costs.

The NRC published a notice of a petition for rulemaking from the Tribal Radioactive Materials Transportation Committee (TRMTC) in the Federal Register on April 9 asking the NRC to revise 10 CFR Part 37 to require that licensees provide advanced notification to participating tribal governments of certain radioactive material shipments that will cross a tribe’s reservation.

The Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2021, signed into law on December 27, includes the Energy Act of 2020 (Energy Act) and the Taxpayer Certainty and Disaster Tax Relief Act of 2020 (Taxpayer Act), which contains tax provisions important to the energy sector.

Under the substantial weight of industry, state, and public pressure, the NRC today published a notice in the Federal Register (85 FR 81960) announcing its withdrawal of its proposed highly controversial reinterpretation of its low-level radioactive waste disposal regulations. The NRC concluded, after consideration of comments, that the proposed changes would not benefit the overall LLW regulatory framework.

A federal grand jury in the Eastern District of Kentucky issued an indictment against an individual for transportation of radioactive material generated from fracking activities without compliance with US Department of Transportation hazardous materials regulations.

The US Department of Energy (DOE) issued a Supplemental Federal Register Notice on June 5 that addresses its interpretation of what constitutes high-level radioactive waste (HLW).

Massachusetts Senator Edward Markey submitted a letter on April 23 to Chairman Kristine Svinicki of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) expressing serious concerns over the storage of spent nuclear fuel at US nuclear sites, particularly at shutdown nuclear plants.

The US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit on June 1 dismissed all of the claims brought by Texas seeking to compel a final decision on Yucca Mountain’s suitability as a nuclear waste repository. See Texas v. United States et al., Case No. 17-60191.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) recently put the final nail in the coffin of a nearly 10-year proposed rulemaking effort that would have required licensees to remediate residual radioactivity resulting from licensed activities during facility operation, rather than at license termination as required by the current rules.

Since 2010, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) Staff has been working on revisions to 10 C.F.R. Part 61, Licensing Requirements for Land Disposal of (Low-Level) Radioactive Waste. The original effort was intended to focus on potential impacts from anticipated disposal of large quantities of depleted uranium (DU), which is considered a “unique waste stream,” from uranium enrichment facilities. But over the course of the last seven years, the Staff’s concerns over other possible unique waste streams grew, and so did the scope of the proposed changes to Part 61.