SPEAKERS CONTENTS INSERTS Tables
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ENERGY AND WATER DEVELOPMENT APPROPRIATIONS FOR 1999
Thursday, March 12, 1998.
NUCLEAR WASTE MANAGEMENT AND DISPOSAL
WITNESSES
JAMES M. OWENDOFF, ACTING ASSISTANT SECRETARY FOR ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT
LAKE H. BARRETT, ACTING DIRECTOR, OFFICE OF CIVILIAN RADIOACTIVE WASTE MANAGEMENT
HOWARD R. CANTER, ACTING DIRECTOR, OFFICE OF FISSILE MATERIALS DISPOSITION
Opening Remarks
Mr. MCDADE. The committee will come to order.
We are privileged to have three very distinguished witnesses with us today who perhaps have the most difficult job in government, and we appreciate all of your attention to it and your bringing your expertise to bear on it. It is a real tough one for you.
Mr. Owendoff, I want to say something to you, if I may, please.
We have been getting testimony up here for a long time, and we have had an opportunity to examine your prepared statement. We think it is absolutely highly, professionally done, very articulate, very pointed, very helpful. And even before you give it, I want to compliment you because we have had a chance to review it.
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We will now recognize you, and you may proceed in your own way, if you want to file your statement and proceed, whatever is comfortable for you.
You are recognized, Mr. Owendoff.
FY 1999 OFFICE OF ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT BUDGET REQUEST
Mr. OWENDOFF. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate that.
I would certainly like to say that it is only by having a good staff that I am able to have those prepared statements, so I would like to recognize the good staff supporting us.
Mr. MCDADE. It always takes a team and a team leader, too.
Oral Statement of James M. Owendoff
Mr. OWENDOFF. It is a pleasure to be here, and I appreciate this opportunity to appear before you to discuss the Department of Energy's Environmental Management Program and its fiscal year 1999 budget request.
Our request for fiscal year 1999 reflects a roughly level budget from last year, with a substantial investment for privatizing certain large cleanup projects. Key accomplishments resulting from this budget will be accelerating cleanup and closure, deployment of new technologies, and progress in resolving the nuclear waste backlog.
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We have set very ambitious goals for closing several sites by the year 2006, including the Rocky Flats Site in Colorado, the Weldon Spring Site in Missouri, as well as the Mound and Fernald Sites in Ohio. Consequently, we are eager to continue working with the Congress to focus funding on cleaning up and closing sites.
The Environmental Management budget also reflects our target of opening the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in May 1998, pending the expected certification from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency this spring. In fiscal year 1999, the WIPP should be accepting defense transuranic waste from as many as six States. This will be a crucial step forward in providing for the permanent disposal of the Department's long-lived radioactive waste.
Perhaps the most important management step we have taken is the establishment of a goal to clean up as many of the remaining 53 contaminated sites as possible by 2006 in a safe and cost-effective manner. By working towards this goal, we can not only reduce the hazards presently facing our workforce and the public, but also reduce the long-term financial burden on the taxpayer.
For every year that a site remains open, we are paying a ''mortgage'' of necessary overhead for activities such as site security, facility operations, personnel, safety and other costs. By completing a cleanup sooner, particularly at sites where we have no other continuing DOE missions, we can substantially reduce these overhead costs.
MORTGAGE COSTS
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Mr. MCDADE. Mr. Owendoff, may I interrupt you for a second?
Your testimony just rings a bell; and mortgage costs have been, as you know, of great concern to the Department and to the committee. And I have, in conversation around the city, have heard a specific number about the savings that are potential just in security alone if you can move, let's say, 5 years in Rocky Flats and close it earlier. Do you have a number that you have had a chance to look at to see what the security savings costs alone would be?
Mr. OWENDOFF. Let me provide that for you, because it is not an easy number. Because some of it has to do with the various materials, mainly plutonium. But whether it is pits or residues or oxides—we will provide you. In fact, we have a chart that is pretty dramatic that I can provide you that shows those reductions.
Mr. MCDADE. You may amplify your answer in the record; and if you would have the chart sent up to the committee, we would appreciate it.
Mr. OWENDOFF. I will provide that, Mr. Chairman.
[The information follows:]
ROCKY FLATS COST SAVINGS
The current cost for Safeguards and Security at Rocky Flats is $65 million per year. Therefore, if closure of Rocky Flats is accelerated from 2010 to 2006, approximately $260 million in Safeguards and Security savings will be realized.
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FY 1999 OFFICE OF ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT BUDGET REQUEST
Mr. MCDADE. Proceed.
Mr. OWENDOFF. By working towards this goal we can not only reduce the hazards presently facing our workforce and the public but also reduce the long-term financial burden. By completing cleanup sooner, particularly at sites where we have no other continuing missions, we can substantially reduce these overhead costs.
SITE CLOSURE AND PROJECT COMPLETION
The fiscal year 1999 budget request reflects a fundamental restructuring to emphasize site closure and project completion.
As you know, the Environmental Management Program is responsible for managing and cleaning up the environmental legacy of the Nation's nuclear weapons and government nuclear energy projects. We have been giving priority to high-risk problems such as stabilizing and ensuring the security of plutonium and stabilizing tanks containing high-level radioactive wastes. We have also addressed problems in order to comply with statutory and regulatory requirements and to meet our legal obligations under our compliance agreements with State and Federal agencies.
We know that successful cleanup also requires investing and developing and deploying more effective technologies. Without successful investments in technology, the cost and technical challenges would make long-term success impossible.
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Finally, we have found that performing good technical work is not enough. Getting the job done requires cooperation with regulators and other stakeholders. We have supported effective public participation through continued relationship with States and site-specific and national advisory boards as well as funding for Indian tribes potentially affected by our activities. We intend to continue improving this process to ensure appropriate representation from elected officials and diversity.
The most significant change in our fiscal year 1999 budget request is a new structure based on our vision of completing cleanup at as many sites as possible by the year 2006. Through this account structure, we are seeking to provide greater accountability to program managers, Congress and the stakeholders.
The new account structure helps highlight how much funding is being provided for: sites where cleanup and closure is expected by 2006; sites where cleanup is expected to be completed by 2006 but where the sites will remain open for other Departmental missions; and sites where cleanup is expected to be completed after 2006.
We believe this budget structure also serves to change the culture at sites from long-term cleanup to completing cleanup and closing sites.
ACCELERATING CLEANUP: PATHS TO CLOSURE
On March 2, 1998, Environmental Management publicly released a draft strategy document, Accelerating Cleanup: Paths To Closure, emphasizing completing cleanup at most sites by 2006. This strategy document consists of integrated life-cycle baselines for 353 discrete cleanup projects that provide the blueprint for completing cleanup at the remaining 53 sites. The draft strategy addresses facilities and materials currently within Environmental Management's responsibility but does not cover any future transfers of responsibility to Environmental Management from other DOE programs for excess facilities.
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The fiscal year 1999 budget is structured to associate the funding request and each project with specific data on past performance and with future commitments to demonstrate the results that have been achieved and the performance to be accomplished for the resources requested.
The goal is to identify complete projects with a clear beginning and end, with measurable performance measures along the way. This will significantly improve management efficiency and accountability, focus funding on tangible outcomes and meet the intent and requirements of the Government Performance and Results Act.
We are now making substantial progress in establishing the flow of waste and materials from cleanup in collaboration with regulators and other stakeholders.
First, the Department is constructing and operating a number of large waste management facilities. To avoid duplication in treating and disposing of similar wastes, the Department is seeking to share facilities with comparable capabilities.
Second, we have been consolidating storage of certain special nuclear materials, such as plutonium.
Third, DOE has proposed shipping certain plutonium oxides and residues from the Rocky Flats Site and the Plutonium Finishing Plant at Hanford to the Savannah River Site in South Carolina, which should considerably accelerate closing of Rocky Flats and the Hanford facility.
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WASTE ISOLATION PILOT PLANT (WIPP)
Finally, the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico, which is expected to begin accepting wastes in 1998, presents one of the most compelling examples of shipping nuclear waste to greatly reduce costs and risks.
Integration of the DOE waste complex will be crucial to our efforts to reduce costs and raise productivity, but it also requires the support of our host States. We would greatly appreciate your help in fostering a sense of national purpose and responsibility among constituent States.
In fiscal year 1999, we are requesting $346 million for program direction. This funding supports a variety of activities that are crucial to improving the cost-effectiveness of the program. Because of the importance of program direction activities, we have substantially reformed this account in the past few years, partly in response to congressional concerns.
PROGRAM DIRECTION ACCOUNT
The program direction account provides funding for Federal personnel salaries and headquarters and field offices as well as necessary funding for technical and analytical support and other related activities that are vital to managing the Environmental Management Program.
In response to congressional concerns about the size of the Federal workforce and headquarters, we have dramatically reduced the number of Federal employees at headquarters. The number has declined from 772 in July of 1995, its highest level, to our current level of 440 employees. That is the number that is supported in the 1999 budget request.
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Similarly, we have reduced the budget for support services at headquarters by 80 percent over a similar period of time. This reduction of over 300 Federal staff at headquarters and 80 percent of our support services budget has occurred at a time when the overall Environmental Management budget has remained fairly level.
We believe that these reductions have been entirely appropriate, allowing us to put more resources into the field where the cleanup work gets done. However, we also believe that further reductions would be extremely disruptive to the Environmental Management Program. The consequences of further reductions could include less ability to carry out and monitor contract reform, reduced analysis of cross-site issues and opportunities, and further disruption of appropriate skill mix.
Again, Mr. Chairman, thank you for the opportunity to speak with you about the Environmental Management Program and its budget request for 1999. And certainly, later on, I would be pleased to respond to your questions.
Mr. MCDADE. Mr. Owendoff, the committee thanks you for an excellent statement.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Owendoff follows:]
"The Official Committee record contains additional material here."
CIVILIAN RADIOACTIVE WASTE MANAGEMENT BUDGET REQUEST
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Mr. MCDADE. Mr. Barrett, we know that you have spent many a long hour working these problems in the Department; and we want to welcome you. You may introduce your statement into the record and proceed in your own way. You have full latitude. We are delighted to hear your testimony.
Oral Statement of Lake H. Barrett
Mr. BARRETT. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman and members of the committee. It is a pleasure to present our fiscal year 1999 budget request.
Permanent disposal of civilian and defense-related high-level radioactive wastes is one of the most complex technological challenges facing our Nation. Our Nation's policy to support geologic disposal is essential not only for commercial spent fuel at reactors but also for the cleanup of our nuclear weapons complex, our international nonproliferation policy, our support of the international consensus on the permanent disposal of nuclear waste, and our national defense mission.
Our major milestone this year is the Yucca Mountain viability assessment. Following the viability assessment, the program's efforts will turn to the completion of the draft environmental impact statement in 1999 and, if the site is found suitable, the recommendation of the site to the President in 2001.
This committee's support of our fiscal year 1999 budget request will enable us to draw considerably closer to a national decision on geologic disposal at Yucca Mountain.
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With your permission, I will submit my statement for the record and would like to summarize the accomplishments we have made and what we intend to do in 1999.
Mr. MCDADE. Without objection.
FY 1998 ACTIVITIES
Mr. BARRETT. Most of our funding in fiscal year 1998 was allocated to the Yucca Mountain Site Characterization Project. A small portion of the budget funds our plans for waste acceptance and transportation.
At Yucca Mountain, our activities focused on the scientific exploration of the site and on the repository and waste package design and engineering to support the viability assessment.
Last year, we completed the 5-mile-long exploratory studies facility tunnel.
In fiscal year 1998, we initiated and will complete, to the west side of the repository block, the excavation of a 15-foot-diameter, almost two-mile-long cross-drift off the main facility tunnel. This cross-drift will cut across the entire potential repository block and will give a more complete three-dimensional view of the area.
Our thermal testing program is under way and is providing valuable information to validate laboratory data and conceptual numerical transport models.
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We are also constructing an underground facility in an area called Busted Butte to examine the rock body that underlies the potential repository horizon. We are conducting total system performance assessments to determine how the repository may perform, based on our waste package and repository designs, for thousands of years in the future.
Our work will culminate this year in the completion of the viability assessment. It will be a comprehensive description of the repository and its performance in the specific Yucca Mountain geologic setting. It will be used as a management tool, to focus future work needed toward the site suitability determination, the site recommendation, and license application.
The viability assessment will provide all parties with a better understanding of the repository design and its performance in a specific Yucca Mountain geologic setting, a better appreciation of the remaining work to prepare a complete license application, and a more precise estimate of the cost of a repository.
We still have work to do before we will be able to prepare a final environmental impact statement in the year 2000, make a site recommendation to the President in 2001, and submit a complete license application to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission in 2002.
In the area of waste acceptance, as everyone knows, January, 1998, came without the initiation of waste acceptance; and we are currently in litigation and discussions with utility contract holders and State organizations. The Department continues to explore ways to proceed in a manner that results in fair and equitable solutions for all the parties. We remain willing to work with the contract holders to address any hardships associated with the delay in the acceptance of spent fuel and to comply with any applicable court order.
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To maintain our readiness to proceed with waste acceptance, we developed and submitted to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission a non-site-specific topical safety analysis report for a spent nuclear fuel interim storage facility. We have just last week received the initial comments from the NRC staff on that report, and we are making progress in that area together.
In the transportation area, we continued development of a market-driven approach, relying on private industry capabilities to accept and transport commercial spent nuclear fuel to a Federal facility when one becomes available.
In the regulatory compliance, program control, and management area, we responded to the committee's direction regarding the use of support service contractors by further limiting their scope of work.
We have also streamlined our operations by reducing headquarters staff. Since 1992, the program has reduced its headquarters staff by over 50 percent and increased the Yucca Mountain staff by 40 percent. We have refocused our staffing where the priority issues are.
FY 1999 REQUEST
Now I would like to turn to how we plan to expend the fiscal year 1999 budget request.
The President's budget request of $380 million for 1999 is consistent with the policy direction provided by you over the last several Energy and Water Development Appropriations Acts. Of the $380 million, the Yucca Mountain Site Characterization Project will receive $298 million. Of the remaining funds, $10 million will fund the Waste Acceptance, Storage and Transportation Project; and $72 million will be required for regulatory compliance, program control, and management functions. Most of these latter funds directly support the Yucca Mountain Site Characterization Project.
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The source of funds is equally divided: $190 million from the nuclear waste fund and $190 million from the defense nuclear waste disposal appropriation.
The $298 million we are requesting for the Yucca Mountain Site Characterization Project will allow us to capitalize on the Yucca Mountain viability assessment information. The budget request will fund activities that are necessary to: continue our efforts to complete site characterization; continue to address remaining uncertainties about the site's ability to isolate and contain nuclear waste; further refine our repository and waste package designs to assist in the assessment of the repository safety strategy and total system performance calculations; complete the final phase of the peer review of the total system performance assessment to support a license application; prepare and issue for public comment the draft environmental impact statement for a geologic repository at Yucca Mountain; and support the preparation of a high-quality, complete and defensible site recommendation and license application.
In fiscal year 1999, the budget request for waste acceptance, storage and transportation activities is $10 million and will be used to support: interactions with the standard contract holders to discuss how best to accommodate the delay in the acceptance of spent fuel from commercial utilities; ongoing non-site-specific responsibilities concerning commercial spent nuclear fuel and long-lead-time items that must precede the removal of spent nuclear fuel from reactor sites once a Federal receiving facility becomes available; interactions with States and Indian tribes to plan for the provision of technical and financial assistance for emergency response training for public safety officials through whose jurisdictions shipments of spent nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive waste will be transported; work on the market-driven approach for waste acceptance and transportation of spent nuclear fuel; and efforts to provide the private sector with incentives to stimulate the development and implementation of storage and transportable canistered systems that could be compatible with repository disposal requirements.
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Our request for the regulatory compliance, program control and management set of activities is $72 million. Funding will be applied as follows:
—$29 million for regulatory compliance related to activities that include nuclear quality assurance/quality control, support for the Yucca Mountain Environmental Impact Statement, independent technical oversight, systems engineering and integration, and necessary records management;
—$8 million for program control that includes planning, program management and control functions, and total life-cycle cost and fee adequacy report preparation; and
—$35 million for management functions that include our Federal salaries, information technology applications, audits, and public information.
Your approval of our fiscal year 1999 budget request will allow us to step closer to being able to make decisions about the suitability of the Yucca Mountain site for development as a permanent geologic repository. We are concluding work we started in 1996. We have gained considerable momentum and have made substantial progress in answering the remaining questions regarding the suitability of the site.
As an aside, but I believe an important one, I would like to tell you that, to date, we have found nothing at Yucca Mountain that indicates that it would be unsuitable as a site for the permanent disposal of spent nuclear fuel or high-level radioactive waste.
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The completion of the Yucca Mountain viability assessment will clarify the direction and scope of remaining work toward a formal site recommendation by the President. With your continued support we will be able to complete our work.
Thank you, and I will be pleased to respond to any questions that you may have.
Mr. MCDADE. Thank you for excellent testimony.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Barrett follows:]
"The Official Committee record contains additional material here."
FY 1999 OFFICE OF FISSILE MATERIALS DISPOSITION BUDGET REQUEST
Mr. MCDADE. Mr. Canter, we are saving the best for the last. I see by your biography that you were 20 years in the nuclear Navy, were you?
Mr. CANTER. Yes, sir, 20 years in the Navy, most of that in the nuclear end of things.
Mr. MCDADE. You were there in the early days?
Mr. CANTER. I worked for the little white-haired admiral for a number of years, and he taught me a few things.
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Mr. MCDADE. I guess.
We are pleased to have you here, Mr. Canter. Delighted to have your testimony. You may file it for the record and proceed independently. You have latitude to do whatever is comfortable.
Mr. FAZIO. Mr. Chairman, I might say I do not remember the little white-haired admiral reading any statement to us. I wonder if you learned to testify as he used to, ad hoc.
Mr. CANTER. We have a unique—with the old joint committee, we had a unique privilege; and that is the draft before testimony was published came over, and we did some editing in the name of security. So we would take out the wild claims that he would make and tone them down. But I know of nobody who has such a privilege today.
Mr. MCDADE. Mr. Canter, over on the floor we call that revision of remarks.
Oral Statement of Howard R. Canter
Mr. CANTER. Mr. Chairman and members of the subcommittee, I am the Acting Director of the Department of Energy's Office of Fissile Materials Disposition. I appreciate the opportunity to appear before you today to testify on the Department's fiscal year 1999 budget for this program. With your permission, I would like to proceed with a brief oral statement and submit the written statement for the record.
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The Department of Energy's Office of Fissile Materials Disposition is responsible for implementing the administration's approach to irreversibly dispose of the national's post-Cold War stockpiles of surplus plutonium and highly enriched uranium and for providing technical support for efforts to attain reciprocal actions for the disposition of surplus Russian plutonium. These important nonproliferation efforts are aimed directly at reducing the threat that nuclear weapons materials could fall into the hands of terrorists or rogue nations.
This past year has been one of transition as we move past the study phase to begin implementing a hybrid strategy for plutonium disposition. We are pursuing both immobilization and burning mixed oxide fuel in existing, domestic commercial reactors. Both approaches would meet the spent fuel standard. That is, the excess weapons plutonium would be converted into a form in which it would be roughly as unattractive and inaccessible for recovery and use in weapons as the plutonium in ordinary commercial spent fuel.
A number of very important activities have been conducted this year to enable surplus weapons plutonium disposition to proceed to the construction phase in the fiscal year 2001–2002 time frame.
These include a recent decision to focus future work in the immobilization area on the use of ceramics as opposed to glass, allowing us to bring immobilization of weapons plutonium one step closer to realization. The soon-to-be-released request for proposals to solicit business proposals from industry to provide MOX fuel and irradiation services is another major step. The start of testing and demonstrating an integrated prototype system at the Los Alamos National Laboratory for disassembling nuclear weapons pits and converting the resulting plutonium metal to a form suitable for either disposition approach as well as for international inspection; and the recently completed round of negotiations with Russia on a bilateral agreement on scientific and technical cooperation in plutonium management and disposition. We expect this agreement to be signed in the near future.
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FY 1999 BUDGET REQUEST
Our fiscal year 1999 budget request for fissile material disposition activities is $169 million, an increase of $65.3 million over fiscal year 1998. The increase will allow the Department to begin the design of key U.S. plutonium disposition facilities for disassembling and converting nuclear weapons pits to unclassified forms and for fabricating mixed oxide fuel and will also allow us to expand the joint technical work with Russia by designing a pilot-scale plutonium conversion system in Russia.
DOE is also completing the analyses necessary to select the sites where surplus plutonium disposition will take place, and we expect to announce this spring the preferred sites for the pit disassembly and conversion facility and the MOX fuel fabrication facility. The Savannah River Site, which has an operational high-level waste vitrification facility, has already been named as the preferred site for immobilization. Following completion of an environmental impact statement later this year, final site selection would appear in a record of decision.
Fiscal year 1999 efforts on the immobilization approach are aimed at resolving technological issues, developing and demonstrating production-scale processes and equipment, and conducting the necessary verification testing of the preferred can-in-canister approach in order to be confident that it can be successfully implemented in a timely and cost-effective manner.
For the MOX/reactor approach, we plan to complete fuel qualification design, initiate licensing efforts and process development for MOX fuel fabrication, continue irradiation tests of the MOX fuel as well as to begin the design of the MOX fuel fabrication facility with a capacity to process 3.5 tons of surplus plutonium oxide per year.
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The next 3 years will be a crucial period in the U.S.-Russian relationship concerning the storage and disposition of surplus weapons plutonium. Work with Russia on small-scale tests and demonstrations of disposition technologies is moving forward, and negotiations with Russia have begun on a framework agreement for plutonium disposition. We recognize, however, that the United States cannot proceed independently to dispose of our surplus plutonium without significant progress from Russia. As a result, the administration will not construct new facilities for disposing of surplus U.S. plutonium unless there is significant progress with Russia on plans for plutonium disposition.
Beginning the design of key U.S. disposition facilities, developing a pilot-scale system in Russia to convert weapons plutonium, and implementing a framework of agreements on plutonium disposition are significant steps in this important nonproliferation program. I believe that these efforts will send a clear signal to the world community regarding U.S. nonproliferation goals, will strengthen our negotiating position with the Russians, and encourage the Russian Government to take significant reciprocal actions to initiate plutonium disposition. It is an investment in our future well worth making.
Thank you very much.
Mr. MCDADE. Thank you, Mr. Canter.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Canter follows:]
"The Official Committee record contains additional material here."
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RUSSIAN NUCLEAR PROGRAM
Mr. MCDADE. Let me ask you a question if I may, just your opinion. There was a change in the control of the Russian nuclear program within the Soviet Union. How do you read that change? Is it positive or is it negative?
Mr. CANTER. Right now, Dr. Adamov has been appointed Minister of Atomic Energy to replace Victor Mikhailov. He is an interesting gentleman. He speaks very good English.
He is sort of more of a modern man, but he ran the institute that was responsible for the design of the Chernobyl-style reactors and has pushed the concept of extending the life of those reactors while most of the Western European nations want them shut down. He was intimately involved with Mikhailov in negotiations with Iran on the reactor sale to Teheran.
So it is not clear that there will be any change in policy that comes out; and, right now, we are proceeding as if there will not be.
TOTAL COST OF CLEANUP
Mr. MCDADE. Sounds like the prudent course, unfortunately.
Mr. Owendoff, let me ask you a couple of questions, please. What is your current estimated total cost of the cleanup program, total cost?
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Mr. OWENDOFF. Within the Paths to Closure that we just came out with, Mr. Chairman, $147 billion is the total cost. I need to point out what is in that, and what is not in that cost, though.
Mr. MCDADE. And the time frame that it is based on, the assumption of how many years to do it?
Mr. OWENDOFF. Certainly. That is broken down. Between 1997 and 2006, it is $57 billion. And then, from 2007 to 2070, it is $90 billion. Mainly what we will be working on beyond 2006, are big-ticket items for high-level waste and transuranic wastes. We will still be doing some decontamination and decommissioning of buildings and some soil and water cleanups also, but the big-ticket items are high-level waste.
But a couple of things that I want to point out that are not in that estimate so it is not misleading as far as how that relates to previous estimates.
We currently have this $8.8 billion estimated costs for cleaning up surplus of facilities for which Environmental Management does not now have the responsibility. Those buildings are still within defense programs or energy research that are surplus facilities. So there is—the estimate of those will require $40 billion. And then there are some active facilities that are still within—that are being utilized within the Department that is about $20 billion. And then we have transferred the responsibility for newly generated waste—in other words, operational facilities at the labs—and that is about $8 billion in those costs through the period out to 2070.
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The main thing, when we presented the Paths to Closure, we did not articulate that now we have significantly reduced the dollars. That wasn't the point. The point of this was that it reflected the strategies of each of the sites and then how that related then to an overall national plan. That is the key that we see, is how do we get to the point of looking project by project, the sequencing of those projects and the critical path? And then it gives us a path to start working and having discussions.
ROCKY FLATS CLOSURE
Mr. MCDADE. Thank you for a very complete answer.
And may I say that, as you know, you are right in tune with the committee when you talk about that. We, by law, required competitive bidding to introduce competition into the system and urged that sites be brought to closure as promptly as possible.
This is your statement, which was so well done; and I want to quote from it: In fiscal year 1995, not very long ago, the former contractor at Rocky Flats said that cleanup and stabilization would not be concluded until 2030 and would cost $18 billion. We got a new contractor, as you know.
Mr. OWENDOFF. Yes, sir.
Mr. MCDADE. And the current estimate is 2010, a saving of 20 years, and think of the mortgage costs involved in that, at an estimated cost of $7.3 billion, $11 billion on the capital costs, on the operating costs to get rid of the thing.
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So we are going to support that kind of conduct, and we want to hear from you about specific candidates you think we can look at for closure.
This committee wants to try to get this done and assist all of you to get it done as promptly as we can. It is in the best interest of the country and the taxpayers to proceed with due diligence, but to get projects brought to closure, and nothing illustrates it more than that particular contract that you and the Department signed and we fund.
The bad news of that story is that we understand you are about $25 million short in this year's budget; and we will be taking a hard look at that to see what, if anything, can be done.
You released a report called ''Accelerating Cleanup'', and you referred to the Path to Closure. One of the major conclusions was the identification of a potential future shortfall between cleanup and cost estimates and projected available funds, and there is a pretty large delta there. What steps, if any, do you recommend that we take to try to cure that problem?
Mr. OWENDOFF. I want to probably start this by saying, Mr. Chairman, that, through the leadership of this subcommittee last year in establishing a closure account, I believe that what that does is it sets a mindset that at those facilities where there is no longer a DOE mission, it establishes a mindset that the business at this site is to get to cleanup and get to closure. It is no longer to continue and to maintain, you know, work as usual.
So I want to say that it is through the subcommittee's leadership that I believe sent a very important message.
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We—last year, you recommended Rocky Flats be put in that and Fernald. In our 1999 budget request, we have included Weldon Springs, which is really a lot farther along even than Fernald is, as well as the Mound facility in Ohio.
As far as what is in our strategy and how that relates to budgets, I want to say that the strategy is not a budget document, but it shows us what are the opportunities when we look at the compliance requirements—how do we structure projects? What is the critical path? How can we do a better job of sequencing and getting those prices down? I think it provides a vehicle for us in working with the regulators and the stakeholders to decide that we had the agreements that were put into place 10 years ago that had milestones going out many, many years.
We see—and I will give an example at Rocky Flats, I think, which is a good example in working with the regulators where we see that they said, all right, we realize that a lot of our compliance requirements were placed on soil and water cleanup, but the biggest risk and the highest mortgage costs are the storage of plutonium.
So we will agree with you. Let's look at kind of a reordering of priorities and let's put the emphasis on the plutonium disposition and removal, getting down those mortgage costs, and then we will then push the cleanup work. Not that we don't want it, not that we are not expecting you to step up and we are not expecting you to walk away, but let's get these high mortgage costs down and then get on with the cleanup.
Through those discussions, you take a hard look at what is happening in those areas that you are deciding to shift and is there a problem? I believe that certainly today we look and see those outyear and see some of those shortfalls. We are concerned about that.
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I want to take just one other minute.
We believe that there is also a lot that will help us with technology development, but then intersite transfers just like what we are doing at Rocky Flats. But I think the States are concerned that they do not see that we have—we are sustaining our funding levels and, thus, they are concerned about working with us on intersite transfers because they believe that would be our way of saying, okay, you are going to fit within the budget instead of meeting your commitments. And I believe that there is the ability in working with you and in working within the administration of saying, if we can convince you or present to you that we are trying to be efficient, get our support costs down, competitive contracting, that then, with that—and then we can demonstrate to you that there are opportunities for life-cycle cost reductions, the States will then say—and then we convince you that sustained funding levels are reasonable, the States will then come in and say we are willing to work with you.
I think what is going to be difficult is today trying to get the States—we are now kind of a chicken-or-the-egg deal—so it is going to get difficult for the States to work with us to get efficient and look at intersite transfers if they just see that we are falling off on our budget. I think 1999 demonstrates how each year, as we work the budgets, we look at the compliance agreements, we get to that stabilized funding level.
Mr. MCDADE. I think that the basic thing, as you mentioned, is building confidence in each other; and I think the key to that is the word ''closure''. That is the reason for the committee setting up the account, and that is the reason we are going to keep pushing it as hard as we can.
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I yield to my friend from California, Mr. Fazio.
FOREIGN SPENT NUCLEAR FUEL SHIPMENTS
Mr. FAZIO. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Welcome all of you.
I thought, Mr. Owendoff, I would ask you a question related to constituent concerns that I hear out in northern California about the transshipment of waste from research reactors overseas and the ultimate disposition in Idaho of them. Would you give me a background? Maybe the committee would benefit from hearing the rationale for the way this program was originally constructed and how it is operating.
Mr. OWENDOFF. From a nonproliferation standpoint, we believe that it is important to return to the United States this foreign-research fuel. It is fuel that was originally enriched in the United States that went to countries both in Europe and in Asia and in South America. That it is important from a nonproliferation standpoint to return that material.
So the question becomes: Where does it return to? Through what avenues? And this gets back to the whole issue of equity, of who should take what risks.
So it is through our public interaction that we accommodate that. So what we look at is principally coming from the West Coast or from the East Coast, how do we get things principally to Idaho or to Savannah River where we have interim storage until we can have the long-term storage?
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So it is through the Concord area that we believe that provides the most appropriate shipping route. We are taking great strides in working with the community, working with the shippers, to ensure that certainly everything is safe and that people are knowledgeable about what we are doing. So we believe—we have more work to do, and we are committed to do that.
Mr. FAZIO. Just to clarify, this is not material that has been developed in any other country? This was developed in the United States and shipped overseas——
Mr. OWENDOFF. That is correct.
Mr. FAZIO [continuing]. To the research reactors? This has not been commercial reactor material or certainly weapons grade material; is that correct? It could be, but it wasn't originally?
Mr. OWENDOFF. It wasn't shipped as that. It was shipped for research activities in foreign countries. At the time when we were——
Mr. FAZIO. Was this in the '50s?
Mr. OWENDOFF. Yes, beginning in 1958.
Mr. FAZIO. The material we fear could be misused for other purposes and that is why we have attempted to comply with agreements we made, we thought for our own benefit upfront, to dispose of it properly here.
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Mr. OWENDOFF. That is correct.
DISPOSING OF NUCLEAR MATERIALS
Mr. FAZIO. Is there concern that we may expand this concept to other kinds of nuclear materials that might also be rationalized to be disposed of here as the safest and best place to do it?
Mr. OWENDOFF. I don't know if Mr. Canter might be able to help me. I just know that, within our area, within the Environmental Management piece, Mr. Fazio, we do not have other things in the pipeline under consideration.
Mr. FAZIO. Mr. Canter, since I am just ranging around, maybe you could comment. If you use this rationale, and I know we have a specific commitment in this case, you could expand this greatly, couldn't you?
Mr. CANTER. Well, this commitment is because this fuel was made with highly enriched uranium, not low enriched uranium. In other words, it is greater than 20 percent uranium 235; and that is the material that you could make weapons out of if somebody were to separate it. There are no plans and I don't think anybody in their right mind would even talk about bringing commercial spent fuel from another nation. Until Lake figures out what he has got.
Mr. FAZIO. But hope springs eternal.
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Mr. CANTER. There is no other activity that I am aware of to bring anything else in. Strictly this highly enriched uranium fuel and its unique features that allow the material to be used if somebody chemically separated it out to be used for making clandestine weapons.
Mr. FAZIO. Can you give us some concept as to how much of this material we are talking about? Where it is in the rest of the world and how much is coming to the East Coast and how much to the West Coast?
Mr. OWENDOFF. I can provide that for the record. It is not an easy answer. It is several countries with certain casks, certain containers and amounts; and so if it is agreeable I will provide that.
[The information follows:]
"The Official Committee record contains additional material here."
FOREIGN SPENT NUCLEAR FUEL SHIPMENTS
Mr. FAZIO. Is it all in the same casks? I mean, is it all being transported in the same manner or are we dealing with a variety of different approaches here?
Mr. OWENDOFF. The fuel itself is in different configurations, but the shipping containers, to my knowledge, they are all designed and built to meet the same regulatory requirements. They have met the NRC standards as far as shipping as well as additional testing. What that means, in the way of testing of those containers, you know, for example, dropping them out of aircraft and things like that so that they meet certain tests.
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Mr. FAZIO. Anything we might be likely to do, I guess.
Mr. OWENDOFF. You try to get the most detrimental impact.
STATE AND LOCAL CONCERNS
Mr. FAZIO. Could you give me some sense of what you may be doing to mollify the concerns of State and local authorities that I know have objected to this?
Mr. OWENDOFF. I think the biggest thing is information, talking with them. We have multiple meetings that we have had with the folks in northern California area to let them—to have a discussion with them. Not one that we just present information and then walk out the door but have a discussion with them on what our plans are, what type of fuel it is, what type of shipping container, what our experiences have been in the past, the routes that we plan to take, how we will work with the carriers and the railroads to ensure that the tracks are in good condition, that we don't ship during a snowstorm, you know, those kinds of things in working through with the communities. We believe that that is probably the major concern, is just uncertainty and not knowing what we are talking about.
Mr. FAZIO. Are you going to, therefore, let all the effected communities know when you are shipping the material or is this, for security purposes, better left unknown?
Mr. OWENDOFF. Let me submit that. I don't want to give you a wrong impression.
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[The information follows:]
COMMUNITY AWARENESS OF SHIPMENTS OF NUCLEAR MATERIALS
The governments of the States through which the shipments of foreign research reactor spent nuclear fuel are transported are well aware of these shipments. The Department has worked closely and will continue to work closely at both the State and local levels to provide training and information to emergency responders, radiological health professionals, and law enforcement personnel in preparation for these shipments. The Department is also working to ensure that stakeholders are aware of the program. For example, for the upcoming west coast shipment, the Department has implemented an extensive awareness program, and is in the process of conducting awareness activities along the potential transportation routes. To date over 3,000 stakeholders have participated in this activity. The Department has also supported independent research to evaluate stakeholder awareness and concerns in California and South Carolina.
In accordance with Nuclear Regulatory Commission requirements, specific operational details for spent fuel shipments (such as the date) are not released to the public prior to the shipments. Each State has a designated point of contact who is notified at least 7 days in advance of a shipment. In practice, state officials know about the shipment well in advance through coordination activities undertaken as part of the transportation planning process. The State's point of contract is responsible for notifying the appropriate personnel and organizations within their State who need to know about an upcoming shipment. Typically this includes law enforcement, emergency responders, and radiological authorities. While the designated routes for the shipments are public information, the schedule for the shipments is protected information.
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STATE AND LOCAL CONCERNS
Mr. OWENDOFF. I will tell you, though, as much as we can, we are making information available. I think certainly one has to take a certain amount of precautions in today's world, because we don't want things to happen.
Mr. FAZIO. Right. I get the impression that we have had a kind of bipartisan outbreak of opposition in a number of States directly effected. Is that your impression?
Mr. OWENDOFF. I don't know if that is the characterization. I think that there has been concern, you know, along the routes.
Mr. FAZIO. Governors, mayors, congressmen?
Mr. OWENDOFF. There has been general concern. That is right.
Mr. FAZIO. Those are sometimes pretty specific in their general concern, but I just want to tell you that I personally support what the Department is doing. Because I don't know that you have, frankly, a lot of alternatives; and I think in the larger picture this is important for purposes of moving from places where we would have far less control over this material to other places where we hopefully can dispose of it properly, something that could become very dangerous.
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But I have to take note of people who might be seen on the political spectrum to my right and left, who have tried to make a political issue out of this; and I think they have had some success. I think it is largely because people don't have any context in which to make judgments about this. It is simply something is coming through my neighborhood, why? And why would I want it?
Could you put it into context for the committee how dangerous this may be compared to some other kinds of things that are traveling on the rails or the highways or what have you?
Mr. OWENDOFF. If I can. Again, I am not trying to beg off, but this is a very sensitive issue, and I don't want to have it mischaracterized, and I don't want to have——
Mr. FAZIO. Someone may read the record.
Mr. OWENDOFF. I expect that. I don't want to, as I say, to mischaracterize what that is, which is what often happens in this type of situation.
Mr. FAZIO. I don't want to mischaracterize it either, but I think we have failed to characterize to a degree, and that creates problems that really are maybe even greater than they ought to be.
Mr. OWENDOFF. Correct.
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[The information follows:]
TRANSPORTATION
The transportation of spent nuclear fuel has been conducted safely for decades and presents no difficult technical challenges. The safety record for spent fuel shipments in the U.S. and in other industrialized nations is enviable. Of the thousands of shipments completed world-wide over the last 30 years, none has resulted in an identifiable injury through release of radioactive material. The U.S. Department of Transportation and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission have developed regulations that control virtually every aspect of spent nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive waste transportation, including the transport packages, physical security, and routing.
These spent nuclear fuel shipments represent a very small fraction of the approximately 300 million shipments of materials per year that are categorized as hazardous. In addition, all shipments will be made in robust containers certified by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission that are designed to contain their contents under both normal and severe accident conditions.
The current regulations used in the U.S. provide a regulatory framework adequate for the Department to implement a safe spent fuel shipping program. These regulations are consistent with those used internationally and have world-wide consensus. The U.S. has shipped safely over 2500 shipments in the last 25 years, with an exemplary safety record. This record supports the fact that the U.S. Department of Transportation and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission have developed regulations that provide reasonable assurance for protection of the safety and health of the public, and the environment, and that strict compliance with these regulations provides the Nation with a safe and effective transportation system.
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DISPOSING OF EXCESS PLUTONIUM
Mr. FAZIO. Mr. Canter, we had opposition last year on the floor from the standpoint of opponents of proliferation of potentially weapons grade material to proposals for the MOX fuel fabrication facility and the pit disassembly and conversion facility. I wonder if you could, from the standpoint of the Department, defend your approach versus some others that have been offered by our colleagues who are as concerned as we, or some would say more so about this concern. I think most of us want to do the right thing on nonproliferation, and yet we haven't got a consensus as to what would be the right way to handle this excess plutonium.
PROLIFERATION CONCERNS
Mr. CANTER. The principal concern that has been expressed, not just on the Hill but in certain nongovernment organization groups, is that using mixed oxide fuel will violate 20 years worth of plutonium policy, head us in the wrong direction. As a result some of the research we have done on this 20 years worth of policy, highlight some interesting facts.
The policy originated with President Gerald Ford. In fact, the original policy document was October 28, 1976, and the policy stated that we should defer indefinitely commercial reprocessing of spent nuclear fuel and the separation of plutonium from that spent fuel. The policy is silent on whether plutonium that is already separated couldn't be consumed in reactors.
President Carter, in April 1977, took some steps to implement that policy further. President Reagan came along and rescinded the policy, interestingly enough, but by then the costs of reprocessing had gone so high that there were no utilities in the United States interested in it. And that happened just about the same time as the Nuclear Waste Policy Act was coming down the pike with a different answer on what to do with spent fuel.
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During the Bush administration, there were no changes. In the Clinton administration, the policy statement was put out in late 1993 that says the United States does not encourage the civil use of plutonium and, therefore, does not itself engage in reprocessing for either nuclear weapons or for nuclear power purposes.
So the villain here is the separating of plutonium from spent fuel so that it is readily usable in weapons. We have plutonium that is already separated. It was separated years ago. We are not talking about reprocessing spent fuel. We are talking about consuming, in fact, putting back into spent fuel the very plutonium that was separated. So we believe that we are very consistent with this policy, and it is the right thing to do.
The other concern and the reason why we have the hybrid strategy is there are uncertainties on all of these things, and we want a backup. Each one is a backup for the other.
But the Russians have expressed a very strong opinion. The Russians are concerned that if we were to immobilize plutonium only, number one, you don't destroy a single atom of it; and, number two, it is still weapons grade, that we are just changing the form for storage and sometime in the dead of night we are going to go try to retrieve this stuff and rebuild the arsenal. They express a concern about the irreversibility of the disarmament process.
So we feel that at least some of the plutonium, possibly the better quality, should go the route of mixed oxide fuel, be used in reactors where we destroy about 30 percent of it and we convert the isotopic distribution of the remainder. It can still be used as a weapon if you were to reprocess that spent fuel, but it is harder, it is no longer weapons grade.
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So we think we are very consistent with the policy. I think there are some people who don't believe that, but that is our position.
DEBATE IN THE FORMER SOVIET UNION (FSU) ON PLUTONIUM DISPOSITION
Mr. FAZIO. Would you typify some of the debate that is taking place in the former Soviet Union on this issue? Because, obviously, there is a real need that we track each other in this regard for mutual security, if not security in the rest of the world.
Mr. CANTER. Several things have happened in the last year in the former Soviet Union. For one thing, this issue of what to do with the plutonium has come to President Yeltsin's attention. That dates back to a joint statement between President Yeltsin and President Clinton in January of 1994 where they asked their, quote, experts to look at the problem. And we did that, and we issued a report in 1996.
The Russians were falling behind us. We were proceeding with making plans, and they didn't seem to be moving ahead.
Last year in July, in fact, July 23rd, President Yeltsin signed a decree, and with this decree he established an interagency standing committee. It is not an ad hoc thing. It is a permanent standing committee made up of agency ministers or deputy ministers, very high-level, chaired by Velikhov. And if you have seen his name around, he happens to be the President of the Kurchatov Institute, but he is also the only nonministerial member of the Russian Defense Council. That is about equivalent to our NSC.
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They have taken on, on an interagency basis, this issue; and they have done certain things. They have come up with the initial declaration of what is excess in Russia that the President announced. They started working on an architecture for what the agreements with the United States should be. They are putting together a recommendation to the President.
We had our record of decision in January 1997. They haven't had any such thing as that. So they are moving ahead to do that and get approval of the President; and, in many respects, they are starting to leapfrog here and move forward on it.
We arranged a meeting—actually, Harvard University arranged it for us; and it worked out very nicely because it wasn't an official government meeting or we would have spent 6 months preparing briefing papers. It was in November up in Cambridge. Some of the members of that committee and some of the members from the State Department, the NSC, DOD, Department of Energy, attended; and we came up with a mutual agreement on an architecture for getting agreements with the Russians for reciprocal action.
The first step in that is a government-to-government agreement on continuing technical cooperation up to and including pilot-scale facilities.
The week before last, I was over there with a team; and in three-and-a-half days we essentially negotiated that agreement. They were very cooperative. They were very professional, and they were interested in it. We have a few things that are bracketed in the agreement right now that we are exchanging faxes on, but we think that will be ready for signature within a couple of months.
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That is the first step. There will be subsequent agreements, and some of them have already started working. So what we are seeing is that, in the last year, I sense a change in the interest at the highest levels in the Russian Government that this is a serious problem, and I can understand that. They have a fear, particularly of the nations along their southern tier, acquiring some of this material and coming up with a weapon; and that is probably a well-placed fear.
So their interest has increased. They are putting some effort into it. The big question is going to be, where does all the money come from? And that is the thing yet to be solved.
Mr. FAZIO. Harder there even than here?
Mr. CANTER. Yes, sir.
Mr. MCDADE. On that happy note I want to inform the people in the audience we have a vote on in the House, and we have 4 minutes to get there. We will recess for 15 minutes. Thank you.
[Recess.]
''PATHS TO CLOSURE'' DRAFT
Mr. KNOLLENBERG [presiding]. I was about to say, the meeting will come to order. But, apparently, it has come to order.
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I will pick up then where Mr. Fazio left off, and I want to—this will be, I think, probably directed more at Mr. Owendoff, but I have a question or two for some others.
It concerns this ''Path to Closure'' draft. On Tuesday we had the opportunity to ask Secretary Pena about that whole process, and I am sure he has shared some of that process with you. I understood by some of what I heard you say, and I was encouraged by some other things. One of the things that disturbed me—and maybe this quote was made in reference to something specific—but it said that cost is not what this is about. I am talking about this whole ''Path to Closure'' draft.
You mentioned, for example, that some $57 billion of that—I thought it was $189 billion. That is what we were told the other day, and I think your numbers come close to that so I am not arguing about that—$57 billion before 2006 and $90 billion after, and then there is still a $40 billion defense matter that is out there. There is a tiny number, $8 billion. I didn't get what that was.
Mr. OWENDOFF. Newly generated waste. In other words, facilities continue to operate, sir.
Mr. KNOLLENBERG. This ''Path to Closure'' draft is a follow-up from the 10-year plan which provided the vision for the whole EM program. I wanted to refer to—I would like to remind everybody on this committee that the vision entailed in the environmental management program of 1996 is something I would just simply like to read to you right now. I have copies of that if anybody wants it.
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But, essentially and specifically, it says, within a decade—and, remember, this is 1996—the Environmental Management Program will complete cleanup at most sites.
I am encouraged by Fernald. I am encouraged by what is taking place at Mound. It looks like Mound will be done in 2005. I think that is in your written testimony. Fernald in 2006.
''At a small number of sites, treatment will continue for the remaining waste streams. This unifying vision will drive budget decisions, sequencing of projects, and actual actions taken to meet program objectives. The vision will be implemented in collaboration with regulators and stakeholders.'' And the principles: reduce mortgage and support costs to free up funds for further risk reduction.
Although the DOE took the 10-year concept out of the title of what is now called the ''Path to Closure'' draft, I want to make sure that you are still committed to cleaning up and closing the EM sites as quickly and as efficiently as possible, and that you are committed to closing as many as you can and is possible by the year 2006.
I am concerned that it is March 12, 1998, and we still don't have even a final report or closure plan. I have been told several times over the last couple of years that a final version was only a month or so away, but we are still waiting for it.
My staff was told on the 27th of February at a briefing where DOE unveiled the ''Path to Closure'' draft, that we can expect a final version by June of 1998. That is 2 or 3, 4 months away. I guess, apparently, the DOE is still looking for additional public comments.
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My concern is, can we confirm June of 1998 is the date that we will indeed have a final version available to us on the EM closure plan? That is June of this year. Could you respond to that?
Mr. OWENDOFF. Sir, our plan is to have it in the June time frame. But let me try to give you certainly some of the complexities and the realities that we have facing us. But, if I can, I would like to just take a step back on an earlier thought.
The reason that we took 2006 out of the title wasn't that we are falling off of 2006, but there was a perception that we are going to quit the Environmental Management cleanup business at 2006 and walk away from the other sites—in other words, the larger sites that are still remaining.
We have, by site, listed the closing dates and our commitment to meet those dates on closing those sites and a similar lineup to what we had in the previous draft. Please don't think that we are falling off of the 2006.
CLOSURE DATES
Mr. KNOLLENBERG. Let me tell you where I am going. It may not be the same road that you are going to take me.
I want to say this, that the ''Path to Closure'' draft assumes a funding baseline of $6 billion. Now that is more money. This baseline, frankly, will result, it says, in the sunset of the program by the year 2070. I am talking about the whole thing.
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But what I am concerned about is this: DOE doesn't even request enough money, enough funding to meet the draft baseline. In everything that we have seen via the contractors and otherwise, they are talking 2010, and that is a ''maybe.'' That is not good enough. In my judgment, it is not. It is a lackluster draft plan, and under the administration's funding request it won't be closed by the year 2010.
I don't think that is what we envisioned. I don't think that is right for the taxpayers. I think there is something that has to be looked at, something finalized so that we can come up with concrete numbers relatively. So I see some flex, some change, perhaps, in attitude.
You mentioned, I think the word was mindset. Well, I like that. If there is a mindset about this that comes into play, we can begin focusing on cleaning up those sites.
ROCKY FLATS CLOSURE
But, Mr. Owendoff, I know you have been the Acting Assistant Secretary of Environmental Management for a very short time; and I don't expect all of this to be something that you are completely familiar with. But I was assured rather, and I want to remind you, assured by your predecessor, Mr. Alm, when he was Assistant Secretary of EM, and I have also been assured by Secretary Peña and by the contractors at Rocky Flats that we can finish cleanup at Rocky Flats by 2006 if the accelerated level of funding is appropriated. And that is not what we are getting.
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I think it is time that we close one of the major sites. Rocky Flats is a major site, Fernald and, of course, some of the others. Certainly that is worthwhile, what we are doing there, and I think that is a target that you can live up to. But I think we have to make sure that that happens.
And I just want to remind you, and it doesn't call for a comment, but remind you of what we have gotten before, what we have had recommended to us, what we had pledged to us by the various individuals, and we want to make sure that that is consistent.
When you are talking about reducing mortgage and support costs, this is done to free up funds to bring about more closure, more cleanup. I think we have to move in that direction.
So I recognize you want to respond, but I am not asking you to. I just want to make sure you understand where we are on this, and I think the committee feels very strongly about moving quickly with closure on these major locations.
VIABILITY ASSESSMENT SCHEDULE
I want to turn now to Mr. Barrett. You had mentioned that nothing stands in the way of that becoming a repository for our spent fuel; and I want to see—I think most of the people on this committee want to see that happen. They want to see Yucca Mountain become that permanent repository.
It appears to me—and this doesn't help you in your work—that the administration is blocking—is certainly providing some obstruction to bringing that about so that we can get on with this business of cleanup.
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It is my understanding that the administration would be willing to support the interim storage facility once the permanent repository at Yucca is approved through a DOE viability assessment. I think you referenced that if not in your speech, in your commentary here.
I further understand the viability assessment will be completed by December of this year, December of 1998. Can you confirm that it will be done by December of 1998?
Mr. BARRETT. We will have the scientific technical work completed by that time. It will be given to the Secretary. The Secretary has said that in December 1998, he expects it to be completed; and I have full confidence that will be the case.
YUCCA MOUNTAIN SUITABILITY
Mr. KNOLLENBERG. I don't know why DOE and the administration are slowing us down on this thing in moving the spent fuel away from our communities. It seems to me that, by moving that waste to one safe, central location, the DOE will be able to comply—if they can comply with all of those legal obligations, we should be able to bring this about, and so we look forward to that taking place. My judgment is that Yucca is the perfect place in this world to put all of that stuff as we call it, the waste.
But, for the record, I want to discuss and, hopefully, refute any doubts of Members of Congress that they may have about the viability of this repository. So let me direct some questions now.
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YUCCA MOUNTAIN TECHNICAL ISSUES
Number one, you have been conducting some heat simulation tests inside of the repository in order to place the integrity of the rock under high temperatures. Can you respond now and can you tell me, are there any showstoppers here that would put a halt to any of that process? What have you learned from these tests? Is it going to be practical?
Mr. BARRETT. We have learned a lot from these tests. They are confirming our laboratory experiments, and the rock and the water is behaving in these experiments as our scientific models are basically predicting.
In refining those models, we have seen no physical situation in the mountain that would make the mountain unsuitable to be a geologic repository. On the other hand, we have not gathered sufficient information to convince the regulatory processes that it would be safe to be a geological repository.
Mr. KNOLLENBERG. What about volcanic activity? Would that prevent us from storing the spent fuel?
Mr. BARRETT. We have done tremendous state-of-the-art work on volcanism. We have submitted our analyses to all the parties, to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
It is our conclusion regarding volcanism that there is an extremely low probability, on the order of less than one in 100 million chances per year, of a volcanic intrusion into the repository; and that would be perfectly satisfactory, in our opinion. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has done a very thorough scientific review of that, and they have concluded that they do not see this as a major issue to prevent a repository.
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Mr. KNOLLENBERG. What about earthquakes?
Mr. BARRETT. We have also done a lot of work on seismic activity. We do not see any reason that the seismicity or earthquake issues would be a major factor as far as preventing a repository from being built there.
Mr. KNOLLENBERG. Lately, chlorine-36 has come into play. I understand that the thought is that, from scientists, that it may be from the atmospheric tests that were done back in the 1940s and 1950s. Is there any reason why we should be concerned about that? In other words, again, is there a showstopper? Is there something that would bring this process to a halt, that would prevent us from storing nuclear fuel there as a result of chlorine-36?
Mr. BARRETT. The chlorine-36 tracers that have been used as part of the experiments underground in the tunnel have indicated that there has been some fairly rapid transport of liquid from the surface down to the repository horizon. This is part of our ongoing hydrological study as to how much water there might be in the future and how that water might interact with any waste package.
We are looking at this very carefully. We don't see anything from the hydrologic studies that would preclude Yucca Mountain from being a repository. On the other hand, we don't have enough scientific information to demonstrate before the Nuclear Regulatory Commission that it would be satisfactory to be a repository, either.
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Mr. KNOLLENBERG. What about water levels that are within the mountain itself where the spent fuel is stored?
Mr. BARRETT. We have established, as part of our hydrologic studies—that the actual saturated zone water is almost a thousand feet below where the proposed repository horizon would be. We believe that it is stable, and that is not an issue. But as far as the actual water transport through the repository horizon, that is a major area of our scientific technical work.
Mr. KNOLLENBERG. Rains or floods have any problem for you?
Mr. BARRETT. We don't see floods. Part of the program is the climatological modeling looking many thousands of years into the future. We believe that we are in a relatively dry period in this interglacial period. When you start to look out thousands of years in the future, we expect it would be wetter at Yucca Mountain; and these analyses are being accounted for in our modeling for thousands of years into the future.
Mr. KNOLLENBERG. Eventually, it will all be stored, the spent fuel, in casks. Do you have any problem with the reliability of the casks?
Mr. BARRETT. The spent fuel would be in what is known as a waste package, a metallic, very thick package placed underground. We believe the capabilities of modern technology are such that we can build those canisters without any major problem.
TRANSPORTATION OF SPENT FUEL
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Mr. KNOLLENBERG. Another controversy that abounds—and I think it is spawned and fueled by speculation—but what about the transportation issue? For example, how long has the Federal Government been transporting spent fuel around the country?
Mr. BARRETT. Transportation of spent fuel has been going on in this country and worldwide for 40 years with an exemplary safety record.
Mr. KNOLLENBERG. How many times has there been an accident with a nuclear waste vehicle?
Mr. BARRETT. There have been several accidents involving nuclear materials when they were being transported. For example, a spent fuel truck in, I believe, the 1960s had an accident on a road in Tennessee; and the driver was killed. However, there were no nuclear aspects to that accident.
Mr. KNOLLENBERG. Outside of that driver, there has been no death or no other——
Mr. BARRETT. There have been routine accidents, but there has been no accident that has been of any nuclear consequence whatsoever over 40 years.
Mr. KNOLLENBERG. No radioactive exposure. Thank you.
We have been talking about volcanos and earthquakes and floods and chlorine-36 and heat tests and automobile accidents or truck accidents, if you will. Is there any other material phenomenon that I am not thinking of which could threaten the integrity of the spent nuclear fuel repository?
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Mr. BARRETT. Well, the main——
Mr. KNOLLENBERG. Like the asteroid that is supposed to be coming in.
Mr. BARRETT. There are scenarios that we consider low-probability events such as the asteroid takes out the world. We haven't studied those type of things. But the main issue we are looking at is the water movement within the mountain, and it is a significant issue, and that is where we are primarily studying today.
Mr. KNOLLENBERG. Is there any reason why we won't reach viability assessment by the end of the year? Anything at all that you can think of in addition?
Mr. BARRETT. I have high confidence that we will complete the viability assessment, and it will be forwarded to the President and the Congress as provided for in the Appropriations Act.
DECISION PROCESS FOR YUCCA MOUNTAIN
Mr. KNOLLENBERG. And you are prepared to name that facility, Yucca Mountain, as the permanent repository after viability and then thus move nuclear wastes to the mountain?
Mr. BARRETT. In accordance with the statutory laws that we must follow, the viability assessment will provide a lot of important information that will be used in the next major decision, which will be the suitability of Yucca Mountain. Following that will be the recommendation from the Secretary to the President after the completion of Environmental Impact Statements. That is scheduled for 2001. That is the major decision point about the suitability of the mountain.
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It will not be the viability assessment that will be conclusive that Yucca Mountain will truly be a repository. The more important decision will be the 2001 site suitability decision, and then we will submit a license application to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
We must then go through an adjudicatory licensing process at which we must demonstrate that we meet all the safety requirements. If we have been able to demonstrate in that adjudicatory process that we meet the requirements we should then have a repository. But that is still a ways away, sir.
Mr. KNOLLENBERG. Are you optimistic?
Mr. BARRETT. Am I optimistic? I am optimistic with reasonable regulatory standards we can meet that.
Mr. KNOLLENBERG. Can we help you with those reasonable regulatory standards in any way?
Mr. BARRETT. At this time, I don't see anything that you could do on that matter.
Mr. KNOLLENBERG. If you do, let us know.
Mr. BARRETT. Yes, sir.
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Mr. KNOLLENBERG. Now we recognize Mr. Visclosky, I believe.
COMMUNITY OUTREACH AND STAKEHOLDER PARTICIPATION
Mr. VISCLOSKY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Owendoff, I appreciated earlier in your colloquy with Mr. Fazio about the transportation of spent materials and your relationship with communities and your outreach and publicity programs. Could you just discuss those for a minute or two?
I would also request if you have some specific procedures or outlines of how you do outreach and communication with officials, you could supply that to our office. I would appreciate it very much.
The reason I ask is that another agency of government is going to be shipping 23,000 pounds of napalm to a plant in my district. That is not nuclear material. It is hazardous material. But it has been a horrific experience because this other agency of government has simply not had any communication, any outreach and made any effort to have any empathy with anybody in my district.
I would like any help you could provide me as to the programs and policies you implement to inform officials and to engage them in a dialogue, because I don't expect anyone to like a program such as the one you run or the one that is coming to my district. But I think that type of program can be very helpful to allay people's fears that are only, I think, exacerbated by people, again, stonewalling. If you could for a minute or two, I would appreciate it very much.
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Mr. OWENDOFF. As I mentioned earlier, I think it is very important to inform the public on what we are talking about: What is the material? What is our approach to that?
We also believe in holding public meetings so people have a chance for us to have a discussion. As I mentioned, not just a presentation and then we walk out the door, but have a meaningful discussion so we can answer the questions. Have those public meetings in schools and public buildings so people have access to that.
We also believe that it is very important to discuss that with the local elected officials so that they understand—as being representatives of the people locally, that they also understand, first, why are we doing this, why we believe it is important in the national interest, the alternatives. It is very important to discuss what other alternatives have we looked at. Because, naturally, a lot of concern is, why have we been chosen to do this? So we go through that.
We also look at transportation—we get with the Department of Transportation if it involves them. If it involves rail, it is Federal Rail Administration—Railroad Administration—and go through what we believe are the type of shipments we are making.
We go through certainly what are the standard requirements that they have, and then we look at how often are we going to be shipping things and should there be—is it prudent to have some additional precautions, you know, considering again what the material is with the approach and what we are doing.
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So it is really hard work to go in, for people to understand. It is not one where we certainly know that everybody likes it, but we try to be genuine in discussing with them what our approach is.
[The information follows:]
PUBLIC OUTREACH IN REGARDS TO THE SHIPMENT OF NUCLEAR MATERIALS
The Department is engaged in an extensive outreach and communication effort with stakeholders, and Congressional, State, Tribal, and local officials to inform, discuss, and prepare for these research reactor spent nuclear fuel shipments to the Savannah River Site (SRS) and the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory (INEEL). This dialogue formally began in 1993 as part of the National Environmental Policy Act process. As part of the program's Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) preparation, 9 scoping meetings and 19 Draft EIS meetings and hearings were conducted to engage stakeholders. The Department has continued to participate in local meetings and hearings throughout the entire transportation planning process. Since the acceptance program began in May 1996, senior staff from headquarters and the field have been meeting with State, local and tribal officials to discuss the program and jurisdictional issues and concerns. The Department has been working with members of Congress, their staffs and other Federal agencies to address concerns and issues. For example, the Department is working cooperatively with the Federal Railroad Administration to address concerns raised by officials in California regarding rail transport through the Feather River Canyon area.
Concurrently, the Department has been meeting with State, local and tribal emergency responders, law enforcement, and medical professionals to assess the level of preparedness, and provide incremental training and equipment to ensure that jurisdictions along the transportation route are prepared. For example, for the upcoming west coast shipment to the INEEL, nearly 2,400 personnel have been trained in preparation for the shipment later this year. The Department uses regional forums, such as the Western Governor's Association and the Southern States Energy Board as well as simulated exercises with local officials and professionals to engage in detailed transportation planning activities, including contingency planning and shipment security.
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Procedures for public outreach for INEEL are described in detail in the Foreign Research Reactor West Coast Shipment Institutional Plan, while the Savannah River Site procedures are contained in the Foreign Research Reactor Spent Nuclear Fuel Transportation and Communication Plans.
DEFINITION OF ''SITES''
Mr. VISCLOSKY. If you have some materials, if you would share those with our office, I would appreciate it very much.
Also, in your testimony you mentioned ''sites'' a number of times as far as some of your accomplishments. My understanding of looking at these is that there were approximately—or are—113 contaminated sites, 60 of which have been cleaned up. You have 53 remaining, and my understanding is that you want 43 of those completed by the year 2006.
The question I have is that you also mentioned that this past fiscal year, 1997, you had completed 411 individual waste site cleanups. What is the difference between those types of sites and the 113?
Mr. OWENDOFF. I might mention—I want to just take a step back, if I may, for a half a minute.
What we have attempted to do in the ''Path to Closure'' 2 years ago was to say we need to have a vision, that kind of like the man-on-the-moon vision, that says, what can we do in the next 10 years? What can we accomplish? And how can we really stretch ourselves and not just be business as usual but stretch ourselves into looking at how you get there?
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Certainly with the moon program, we did not know at the time in the 1960s how we were going to get there. But you begin to lay out some framework that says, how can we accomplish that? And you look at each one of the sites that we have and say, what are your current costs? What are the things that are driving your mortgage rates? And then how can you go—what is the critical path? How can you projectize the work that needs to be done, look at the sequence? How can I bring in technology development to make improvements, integration across the complex?
So, with that, it is really stretching ourselves. We do not have all the answers there, but it allows for there to be, again, some meaningful dialogue. Kind of the previous discussion that we just had, some meaningful dialogue with folks on, what are you planning to do? What are the steps? How are you sequencing? And maybe we can do this or that better.
As far as a particular—the 113, I will refer to those as geographic sites like Rocky Flats or Savannah River. Within each one of those, there are individual what we call release sites. There will be areas where contamination has taken place. The concern is if we don't have some intermediate performance measures that demonstrates how you are progressing say at Savannah River to get the cleanup completed, then everybody is just waiting until the whole site is done.
So what we have done, and you will notice in the 1999 budget submission for the first time that we have done it this year, is to look at—we make some commitments to the Congress on how many buildings will we have decontaminated. How many individual contaminated release sites will we have done? How much volume of low-level waste will we have treated and disposed of? And that is, again on release sites, we have some 4,000 release sites across—some geographic sites may have 100 release sites, say, at Hanford or a couple of hundred. So it is the smaller individual areas on a particular geographic site.
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Mr. VISCLOSKY. So you have some standard with which to measure your progress or lack thereof of each of these things?
Mr. OWENDOFF. That is correct. And with next year's budget we will give you the total universe, tell you how many we have done to date and what our plan is then each year to work those off. We were not able to get that in the 1999 budget on the total universe, but we will have that in next year's budget.
TECHNOLOGY DEVELOPMENT
Mr. VISCLOSKY. You also mentioned the introduction of new technologies, and you developed 50 new technologies, 40 of you which introduced. Could you also describe that? Because I am an accounting major, and I don't understand the nuances of nuclear technology, but that seems like a lot of new technology. Are they variations on a theme?
Mr. OWENDOFF. I will just give the picture of what we are attempting to do and why counting technologies is a very difficult thing and thus we are not trying to take, you know, large number credit.
I think what we have provided in the budget as you walk through there is we have demonstrated how we are actually using technologies at individual sites for cleanups. And what happens on some of the complex remediation work, you will have one technology that you need to do an analysis of what is the condition, what is the soil sample like and how do you accomplish that? Do you have to dig up the soil through bore holes or can you do punch down with a probe at the end?
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So as you go through a particular cleanup of a release site, you are going to have several technologies that are involved in that. And we may have technologies that were used in one case decontaminating a building and we have not tried that particular technology on soil cleanup. So that is how—again, not trying to triple count.
Probably what is more meaningful is that we have provided a by-site look at innovative technologies that we are actually using at those sites; and we are trying to, again, in our efforts to reduce mortgage costs, to be more cost-effective, putting out competitive contracts, that we are getting in the best and the brightest to look at the cleanup problems we have.
Mr. VISCLOSKY. Thank you very much.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. MCDADE [presiding]. The gentleman from New Jersey is recognized.
VIABILITY ASSESSMENT
Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
A question for the gentlemen. Good morning. It is still morning, although you wouldn't know it.
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Mr. Barrett, I just have a question relative to the Office of Civilian Radioactive Waste Management in your statement. Could you explain to me what this sentence means? The fiscal year 1999 budget request will allow us to capitalize on the Yucca Mountain viability assessment as we progress towards a national decision on the geologic disposal option. What does that mean?
Mr. BARRETT. Yes, sir. The viability assessment will be a compilation of all the science and engineering that we have basically done to date, where we will pull it all together in an integrated fashion at the end of this year. That will give us a base of where we are, what additional work needs to be done to complete the remaining work for a presidential decision on the suitability of the site, and the information necessary for a license application to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
So we will lay out that work that remains in front of us. So our 1999 work, which is after the viability assessment is completed, will be based upon that.
PROGRESS AT YUCCA MOUNTAIN
Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. The operative verbs throughout your statement are to continue, to further refine, to strengthen, to prepare an issue, to support, to work with.
The public has a right to know at some point in time whether we are going to fish or cut bait on Yucca Mountain. The Department was good enough to host me when I went down there 5 miles into the mountain where I thought it was fascinating. But, in reality, a lot of money has been spent on this project.
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I am excited by it. I support the idea of a national repository. But when it is all said and done, all of this money has been spent, an incredible amount of reports have been sent to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and half a dozen and other agencies that may have some responsibility for oversight. Is anything ever going to happen with this project?
Mr. BARRETT. All I can say, from the Department of Energy's perspective, we are doing the world-class science that supports the project. But it is not the Department of Energy's decision to do a repository or not. The Secretary makes a recommendation to the President. The President must make a decision. The governor then has the right of disapproval in accordance with the Act. If that happens——
Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. This is a colossal undertaking. This must be one of the largest gargantuan public works projects in the history of our Nation. I am fascinated by the people that work in that environment. I salute them. They are amazing. They are the same type of people that do work building tunnels under the Hudson River. They are remarkable by any definition.
But when it is all said and done, is this thing ever going to be used? And I think our job here is to certainly promote the idea. And you are doing the science to back it up. But I would like to know whether you think this thing is ever going to be a reality.
Mr. BARRETT. I hope that it will be a reality. I mean, one of the key things that we do not have at this time are national standards. How safe is safe enough and for how many thousands of years into the future? That is undergoing the processes under the Energy Policy Act of 1992.
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SPENT FUEL STORAGE
Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. How safe is it now? How many sites are there on a national basis where these wastes are located?
Mr. BARRETT. These materials are located at the commercial nuclear power plant sites as well as the DOE sites, approximately 80 sites across the Nation.
Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Eighty sites. Well, in my arguments for this repository I often say is it better to have one site where these things could be located. And I had understand there are transportation issues, there are environmental issues, seismic issues. I mean, I think that the people in the Department of Energy ought to be far more proactive.
I understand the political considerations here. But I think this is a national disaster in the making, allowing 80 sites, even though they may be well protected—and God only knows if they are, in all instances—to continue to allow these wastes to be kept there with really no push from the administration. Everybody seems to be waiting upon the President and the Secretary to sort of change their mind.
But, in terms of your efforts and the amount of money that we have expended here, you are 100 percent behind this option?
SUPPORT FOR GEOLOGIC DISPOSAL
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Mr. BARRETT. We are. Secretary Peña has supported me. The President has supported the Secretary and we are proceeding ahead as quickly as due diligence and science allows us on evaluating the Yucca Mountain site. I believe that is a solid commitment from the administration.
Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Well, I don't get the feeling that the administration is behind this as a possible site. I mean, that is the gut feeling I get.
I am all for the science. I am for checking everything out. But most of us get the gut feeling—I will speak for myself—that this thing is never going to happen. And that would be an absolute tragedy.
At some point in time, and this is a good time to do it since the President is in his last term. This is a time somewhat to be more courageous. Let's do something.
Certainly a lot of people have paid money into this fund, the purposes of which are to see this thing to fruition. So it is an annual plea. It is not so much of a question. Maybe it is rhetorical, but I think the bottom line is that we need to do something. Thank you for your efforts and for being somewhat the apologist for the situation that is not totally within your control.
Thank you.
LITIGATION
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Mr. MCDADE. Mr. Barrett, a very important issue which we haven't addressed and we have to and we have to get, as usual, your candid answers is the question of the lawsuit that is pending against the Department for contempt of court for failure to comply with the 1998 guideline to receive wastes. You have got a tiger by the tail in the sense of the 50 States and the unified utility industry, don't you?
Mr. BARRETT. It is an extremely complex matter.
Mr. MCDADE. Describe it, would you please? I don't mean to try to simplify it.
Mr. BARRETT. It is an extremely complex issue of economics and legalities going on in multiple arenas that are all intertied. To try to summarize the situation, the Circuit Court of Appeals in November produced a ruling, based on the previous litigation of the utilities in many of the States, and in that they concluded that we should try to proceed to see if the delays clause within the existing contract between the Department and the utilities would be an adequate remedy to resolve the delays. We are in the process and ready to do that.
In addition, the Federal Government, the Department of Justice, asked for a rehearing from that court as to the appropriateness of that ruling and the appropriateness of that court to make that ruling; and that is under consideration by the court.
Forty-one utilities and 49 State organizations also went back to the same court and have requested that the court order DOE to comply with what they originally were asking for, such as escrow the money. Also, if any money was to be paid, it was not to be ratepayer funds; and that, again, rests before the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit.
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In addition, two utilities have gone to the Federal Court of Claims, claiming a partial breach of contract and are requesting $60 million and $90 million in damages in the Court of Claims.
Mr. FAZIO. Excuse me. Would you tell me who these two are for the record?
Mr. BARRETT. Yes. Yankee Atomic. That is the Massachusetts plant and also the Connecticut Yankee plant. Both of those are shutdown reactors, and the fuel remains on those sites due on our inability to move the fuel.
The Secretary has met with the utilities and with the States, and we have discussions going on to see if there can be an equitable resolution of this matter within the existing statutes that we can do. So——
INTERACTIONS WITH UTILITIES
Mr. MCDADE. Are those discussions encompassing everybody that is in this fight, the Court of Claims, the States, the utilities?
Mr. BARRETT. We have offered and the Secretary has personally met with the utility CEOs and the State regulators and also environmental groups. I am in contact with virtually all of those groups at one time or another. There are certain issues that we are discussing in confidence, and then there are many other issues that go on that control the timing.
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Mr. MCDADE. You could say that everybody is under the tent, can't you?
Mr. BARRETT. Everybody is engaged, sir.
Mr. MCDADE. You don't have anybody dissenting and staying outside of the negotiations?
Mr. BARRETT. There are some utility contract holders that for reasons that are theirs, haven't engaged with us in any dialogue. That is their choice.
Mr. MCDADE. That is what I wanted to ask you. What is the number that have taken that position?
Mr. BARRETT. I could provide—we have sent official letters in this process over the last year. Most contract holders have responded in one way or another. Some have chosen not to. I could supply for the record the half dozen or so——
Mr. MCDADE. Elaborate it on the record, if you like, and give us detailed description of who the people who are not in the negotiations are. And if you care to express your personal opinion as to why, we would like to know that, too.
Mr. BARRETT. Yes, sir.
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[The information follows:]
DISCUSSIONS WITH CONTRACT HOLDERS
The Department has attempted to engage all of the utility Standard Contract holders through several mechanisms (e.g., written requests, face-to-face). To date, only one utility contract holder, South Carolina Electric and Gas, has not engaged the Department in any way. South Carolina Electric and Gas owns the Summer Nuclear Station in Jenkinsville, South Carolina. The Summer Nuclear Station is a single unit 885 MWe Pressurized Water Reactor that began operation in 1982. The Department is unaware of reasons why this utility has not engaged the Department.
UTILITY LITIGATION
Mr. MCDADE. What is the Department going to do if you have to compensate all of these people?
Mr. BARRETT. That is a complex legal matter, also.
Mr. FAZIO. We will stipulate to that.
Mr. MCDADE. They have you in charge of complexities down there.
Mr. BARRETT. The Federal Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit in their November ruling stated that the existing contract was a potentially adequate remedy. Now, under that, I will briefly describe what that process would be.
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Under the avoidable delays clause—and the Court said we could not use the unavoidable delays clause. The way the avoidable delays clause is set up is that either party that causes the delay must address that delay. In this case, it is the Federal Government in the totality that is causing the delay, so I will not discuss the utilities being late, because they are not.
The person who is delayed, which are the utilities in this case, would provide information to the Department of Energy that these are the costs caused by the delay. And the contract states, and I will quote: that charges and schedules specified by this contract will be equitably adjusted to reflect any additional estimated costs incurred.
Now, no utility to date has submitted a claim to us for what the delays are. Most of those have chosen to go back into the court. Now, if they were to submit a claim to us, we would, following due legal process, process that. If we were to determine, and there is an appeals process specified also in the contract——
Mr. MCDADE. Outside the court system?
Mr. BARRETT. There is a contracting officer.
Mr. MCDADE. Mediation type?
Mr. BARRETT. Not mediation, sir. What is in the contract is our contracting officer makes the decision. If the utilities do not believe that is a proper decision, they may take it to the Department of Energy Board of Contract Appeals, which is an independent board of appeals within the Department of Energy that reports to the Secretary.
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The Board of Contract Appeals could rule on it; and if they rule—let's assume that they rule for the utility, then we would have to deal with it. If they ruled against the utility, the utility would then have the right to go into the court system. So it is a fairly complex matter, but those are the rights under the contract.
NUCLEAR WASTE FUND FEES
Mr. MCDADE. I didn't mean to divert you.
Mr. BARRETT. Now the charges referred to in the contract is each nuclear utility pays one mil, that is one-tenth of a percent to the Federal Government, for every kilowatt hour of electricity generated by nuclear power. This is approximately $630 million a year based on nuclear electricity generation in the United States now.
What we would do is, whatever the costs of the delay were, we would tell that utility, you may reduce your payments—your charges have been adjusted. So they would pay less into the Federal Treasury to cover what the fair cost of the delay would be.
What becomes an inequity in this and why utilities do not like this, is what would happen. We must also look at the adequacy of the waste fund to support this program. The basic premise in the 1982 Act was the generator of this waste shall pay for its ultimate disposition. That is why the utilities paid all of this money. So if we had a lot of these damage claims that were appropriate claims and we reduced charges for operating reactors, it could eventually come to a situation where there may not be enough money in the fund to perform this job.
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Then, under the statute, the Secretary would have to raise the fee and that would lay before the Congress; and what you are doing is reallocating the utility's own money. I do not believe that is what the intent of the Court was, but that is what the reading of the contract and what the Court told us to do.
So this is an issue that the utilities have gone back to the Court over. They are asking the Court of Appeals to rule that this is not an equitable solution under the court order. This will be a matter for the people who wear the black robes to decide, and they will do that.
Mr. MCDADE. Sometime.
Mr. BARRETT. Yes, sir.
Mr. MCDADE. If it goes back—you said if you reach an agreement, it lays in front of Congress. Does that mean that there is a provision within the procedures to place the final decision for an up-or-down vote before the House and the Senate, or is it just an information thing?
Mr. BARRETT. In the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982, if the Secretary believes that 1 mil per kilowatt hour must be raised and to date we have said there is adequate money in the waste fund in our analyses to date, the Secretary would propose an increase and that would lay before the Congress.
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I will have to check in the Act exactly what the wording would be, because I don't recall at this very moment, but there is a provision in the Act relating to this. I don't know if it takes a vote or if it just happens after a certain time period. I will provide that for the record.
[The information follows:]
CONGRESSIONAL ACTION ON NUCLEAR WASTE FUND FEE
The fee of 1.0 mil per kilowatt-hour for disposal of spent nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive waste was established by section 302(a)(2) of the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982 (NWPA). It provides Congress with a specific role and time period to act with respect to adjustments to the fee proposed by the Secretary of Energy.
Section 302(a) of the NWPA further specifies that ''. . . [i]n the event the Secretary determines that either insufficient or excess revenues are being collected, in order to recover the costs as defined in subsection (d), the Secretary shall propose an adjustment to the fee to insure full cost recovery. The Secretary shall immediately transmit this proposal for such an adjustment to Congress. The adjusted fee proposed by the Secretary shall be effective after a period of 90 days of continuous session have elapsed following the receipt of such transmittal unless during such 90-day period either House of Congress adopts a resolution disapproving the Secretary's proposed adjustment in accordance with the procedures set forth for congressional review of an energy action under section 551 of the Energy Policy and Conservation Act.''
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PAYMENT OF CLAIMS
Mr. MCDADE. Give us an estimate for the record, too, as to the amount if they did have to do it, how much it would be. You talked about $600 million currently, did you?
Mr. BARRETT. The utilities presently are paying into the nuclear waste fund around $600-plus million a year. The balance in that is about $6 billion today as we speak. The amount of damages is a highly variable number that they may claim. Some statements are it is up to at high as $100 billion. Others might look at it, if it is the true cost of the additional storage, as more in the tens of millions of dollars. But it is a large variance that, until the process is finished, I would hesitate to speculate on what those might be.
[The information follows:]
ESTIMATE OF COSTS OF DAMAGES
It is not possible to estimate the cost of compensating utilities for the Department's delay and the resolution of claims will likely turn on highly fact-specific and individualized decisions about the costs incurred by each contract holder as a result of the delay. To date, only two utilities have filed suits for monetary damages in the Federal Court of Claims, Yankee Atomic Electric Company and Connecticut Yankee Atomic Power Company. Yankee Atomic has claimed more than $70 million in