ANS Congressional Testimony Urges for U.S. Leadership in Nuclear Technology
ANS President Hoffman calls for federal action on several global nuclear matters
While complimenting the efforts of the Obama administration to allocate funds for nuclear energy research and development, the American Nuclear Society (ANS) called for federal leadership in emerging nuclear technologies.
In testimony provided to the U.S. House Appropriations Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development, ANS President Donald R. Hoffman noted that, “This year's budget represents a marked improvement over the deficiencies of previous years’ requests.”
Hoffman outlined several areas of importance to the nuclear energy industry for the FY 15 budget including:
Spent Nuclear Fuel and High-Level Waste
“We urge the Subcommittee to provide bill language allowing Nuclear Waste Fund appropriations to be transferred to the NRC for licensing activities related to Yucca Mountain. In addition, ANS believes that Congress and the administration need to move toward siting one independent spent fuel storage installations (ISFSI) and to expeditiously begin receipt of spent fuel into these ISFSI.”
SMR Technical Support Program
“The U.S. is in a full scale race with other nations, such as Russia, China, Korea, and India, to develop and deploy small modular reactor (SMR) technology. SMRs offer perhaps one of the best opportunities for improving the U.S. nuclear export portfolio and create manufacturing jobs in the US.”
Department of Energy University Programs
“… Ensuring a continued supply of US nuclear engineers is critical to the federal government's nuclear safety and nonproliferation missions.”
The full testimony can be found on the ANS website at: http://www.ans.org/about/officers/docs/ANS-2014-Testimony-to-EWA-Ctee.pdf
