Recognizing the challenges that nuclear materials licensees may face in meeting certain regulatory requirements, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission has developed options for licensees that may need regulatory relief during the COVID-19 pandemic. The options for providing regulatory relief were outlined in an April 7 letter from the NRC to licensees authorized to possess by-product, source, and special nuclear materials, including licensed nuclear materials users, uranium recovery, decommissioning (both materials and users), fuel facilities, and spent nuclear fuel storage facilities.

Surry Power Station. Photo: Dominion Energy.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission issued its final supplemental environmental impact statement (EIS) on April 6 for Dominion Energy’s subsequent license renewal (SLR) application for Surry-1 and -2, concluding that the potential environmental impacts from continued operation of the units are not substantial enough to prevent the agency from considering issuance of the SLRs. The NRC had issued its final safety evaluation report on the Surry SLR application on March 9, with a similarly positive conclusion.

The Department of Defense extended the comment period on the scope of an environmental impact statement for the construction and demonstration of a prototype mobile microreactor through April 30. The public comment opportunity opened on March 2 and was initially set to close on April 1.

The Nuclear Energy Institute has released Nuclear by the Numbers, a 28-page report brimming with statistics showing the benefits of U.S. nuclear power generation. NEI issued a summary of the report in March (NN, Apr. 2020, p. 19).

The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on universities has been wide-ranging, as it has forced remote learning across campuses, with a few exceptions.

Steve Biegalski, chair of the Nuclear Engineering Department Heads Organization (NEDHO), whose membership consists of 44 academic institutions, said that the group’s universities have also transitioned to online education. The switch has gone fairly well, he said, adding that laboratory courses have not transitioned as well as regular classroom lectures. The biggest impact, however, has been in the area of research.

The New Jersey Board of Public Utilities (BPU) initiated an investigation into possible alternatives to participation in the regional capacity market administered by PJM Interconnection, New Jersey’s regional transmission organization.

The Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management (EM) has reduced operations at the majority of its cleanup sites as a result of stay-at-home orders in some states. The DOE said that most EM sites have transitioned to “essential mission-critical operations status with maximum telework” as a response to the coronavirus pandemic. The DOE said that EM is continuing to monitor developments associated with COVID-19 and is evaluating its potential impacts on projects.

The International Atomic Energy Agency has dispatched equipment to more than 40 countries to enable them to rapidly detect the coronavirus that causes COVID-19, the agency announced on April 1. The IAEA said that the action is part of its response to requests for support from about 90 member states in controlling the number of infections worldwide.

When the COVID-19 pandemic forced 2020 ANS Student Conference organizers to cancel plans to meet in person on the campus of North Carolina State University, they already had a full calendar of events and hundreds of registered attendees. While the meeting could be rescheduled, graduating students who had signed up to participate in the Student Design Competition would miss the chance to present their research. Finding a way for those students to present their work was a priority.

As is the case on every 10APR, I find myself – even in the midst of the present national and, really, worldwide crisis – returning to thoughts of the USS THRESHER on this date in 1963. All of us who have been through the Naval Nuclear Power Program and served in submarines are aware to greater or lesser extent what happened; my experience, having served aboard one of the SUBSAFE boats whose development was a direct result of the accident, lends perhaps to more sustained reflection.

Cases of the COVID-19 virus have been confirmed at nuclear power facilities in Pennsylvania, Georgia, and Illinois at this writing: five at the Limerick plant, one at the Susquehanna plant, one at Vogtle, and one at Quad Cities.

The U.S. healthcare industry is warning that the COVID-19 pandemic may threaten supplies of the medical radioisotope molybdenum-99, whose decay product, technetium-99m, is considered the workhorse isotope in nuclear medicine for diagnostic imaging. The online magazine Radiology Business recently reported that the American Society of Nuclear Cardiology (ASNC) alerted its members on April 1 that it is monitoring supply shortages of Mo-99 “more closely than ever” during the pandemic.

Maria Korsnick, president of the Nuclear Energy Institute, wrote a letter to Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin and Assistant to the President for Economic Policy Larry Kudlow on March 19, citing the “severe financial strain” being anticipated or experienced by the organization’s member companies due to the COVID-19 crisis. Korsnick offered a number of policy and legislative proposals that, she said, “would be of immediate benefit in helping the people and the companies of our nation’s nuclear energy sector to withstand the ongoing operational and economic disruption.”

The Department of Homeland Security’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) has updated its list of who should be considered an indispensable part of the nation’s critical infrastructure workforce during the COVID-19 pandemic, adding more specificity for the nuclear sector.

The update was released on March 28, one week after CISA issued Guidance on the Essential Critical Infrastructure Workforce: Ensuring Community and National Resilience in COVID-19 Response, Version 1.0. In that initial document, the agency made only three explicit references to nuclear employees, identifying workers “needed for safe and secure operations at nuclear generation,” as well as those involved in critical manufacturing or hazardous materials work at nuclear facilities.

An International Atomic Energy Agency team of experts said in a review published on April 2 that the two options for the controlled disposal of treated water stored at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant are “technically feasible.” A Japanese advisory subcommittee outlined the two options—vapor release and discharge to the sea—for the water that is being stored at the plant following the 2011 accident.

The Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management (EM) has issued an outline of planned accomplishments over the next decade to capitalize on progress it has made in cleaning up former government weapons and research sites over its first 30 years. The release of the 66-page report, A Time of Transition and Transformation: EM Vision 2020-2030, was announced on March 9 by William “Ike” White, DOE senior advisor for environmental management, during the 2020 Waste Management Conference in Phoenix, Ariz.

Ongoing efforts to deal with the coronavirus pandemic could hinder progress at the reactor construction project currently under way at the Vogtle nuclear plant near Waynesboro, Ga., according to a Southern Company report filed on April 1 with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

ANS Executive Director/Chief Executive Officer Craig Piercy has submitted testimony on the administration’s proposed Fiscal Year 2021 Department of Energy budget to the House and Senate Appropriations subcommittees on Energy and Water Development, urging congressional appropriators to increase funding for nuclear-related programs. The testimony was submitted on March 31.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission on March 24 relicensed the only uranium conversion plant in the United States, Honeywell International’s Metropolis Works.

Metropolis Works can now operate until March 24, 2060, potentially logging operations for over a century. Built in 1958 to produce uranium hexafluoride (UF6) for the U.S. government, Metropolis Works began selling UF6 on the commercial market in 1968.

Southern Company subsidiary Georgia Power announced on March 27 that the Unit 4 vessel top head has been placed, following the completion of major lifts inside the containment vessel. The milestone comes approximately one year after Unit 3’s containment vessel top was lifted into place.