Author: Betsy Russell, Idaho Press
Idaho's entire congressional delegation has sent a letter to U.S. Department of Energy Secretary Dan Brouillette urging him to do more to get spent nuclear fuel at the DOE site west of Idaho Falls ready for removal, writes Post Register reporter Nathan Brown. They're asking Brouillette to start packing waste in interim storage at the site now in road-ready containers, which the U.S. Navy is already doing with the spent fuel at the Naval Reactors Facility at the site. This way, it will be ready to go if a permanent nuclear waste repository is opened elsewhere. They are also asking the department "to initiate activities needed to begin loading of spent nuclear fuel into a multi-purpose canister at the Idaho National Laboratory using existing facilities."
"We believe these modest steps toward demonstrating spent nuclear packaging capabilities at Idaho National Laboratory site will further the goals of the 1995 Settlement Agreement, the 2019 Supplemental Agreement and the 2020 Advanced Test Reactor spent nuclear fuel agreement," wrote U.S. Reps. Mike Simpson and Russ Fulcher, and U.S. Sens. Jim Risch and Mike Crapo.
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