Hosted to coincide and complement the main agenda of COP29, FTSessions @COP will host debates and discussions which will evaluate and reflecte on negotiations, announcements and agreements taking place during COP29.
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by Robert (RJ) Johnston • Financial Times• November 15, 2024
Energy Explained
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China’s demand for oil, long an important driver of global oil demand growth, slowed dramatically during January–September 2024. Between 2000 and 2023, China accounted for 50 percent of...
In passing and signing the Inflation Reduction Act in 2022, Congress and the Biden administration infused hundreds of billions of dollars into the energy transition. It was the...
A presentation and discussion of the IEEJ’s (Institute of Energy Economics, Japan) Outlook 2025: “How to Address the Uncertainties Surrounding the Energy Transition”
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• Center on Global Energy Policy
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March 26, 2024, marks the 25th anniversary of operations at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP). Located about 30 miles southeast of Carlsbad, New Mexico, in the Chihuahuan Desert, WIPP is the nation’s only deep geologic repository for the disposal of nuclear waste, and is legally restricted to disposal of defense-related transuranic (TRU) waste. The United States has other inventories of long-lived radionuclides that will eventually need the isolation afforded by a facility like WIPP, including, in particular, 90,000+ metric tons of spent nuclear fuel (SNF) from the operation of commercial nuclear power plants[1] as well as over 11,000 metric tons-equivalent of high-level nuclear waste (HLW) from the US nuclear weapons program.
WIPP’s mission is rooted in national defense. When the US nuclear weapons program began in the 1940s, TRU waste—that is, tools, rags, protective clothing, sludges, soil, and other materials contaminated with elements that have atomic numbers greater than uranium[2]—began to accumulate. The Atomic Energy Commission became interested in a potential disposal site in southeastern New Mexico after being invited by a few Carlsbad leaders.[3] Reaching 2,150 feet below the earth’s surface, WIPP utilizes underground rock salt from the Permian Basin which will eventually permanently encapsulate the emplaced waste packages.[4] From preliminary work in the 1970s, it took about 25 years to site, license, and construct the facility before operations began in 1999.
Bipartisan Support
The WIPP facility permanently disposes of radioactive materials after they are packed in drums and special containers and shipped by WIPP trucks over routes approved by federal and state regulators.[5] To date, WIPP has received 13,843 TRU waste shipments from across 22 sites of the United States Department of Energy (DOE).[6] The safe transportation record of shipments of nuclear waste to the WIPP site has been acknowledged, and even suggested as a possible model for the eventual transportation of SNF and HLW, by groups such as the Western Governors Association.[7]
The state of New Mexico had been receiving funding from the DOE since 1998 for the purpose of road improvements in connection with waste shipments. The Waste Isolation Pilot Plant Land Withdrawal Act (Public Law 102-579) authorized payments to the State of New Mexico in the amount of $20 million (plus inflation) for each fiscal year (FY 1998–FY 2011).[8]
In 2012, when the Blue Ribbon Commission on America’s Nuclear Future recommended that the United States begin a new “consent-based” approach to siting and licensing more repositories,[9] its reasoning was partly based on the experience at WIPP. The repository can be fairly characterized as the successful outcome of a consent-based process where the local community and the state, for the most part, supported the project on a bipartisan basis. Just last year, a Democratic administration in New Mexico renewed the operating permit for WIPP[10] for an additional 10 years.[11] The previous Republican administration had been supportive of the WIPP facility, too.
The recent agreement between New Mexico and DOE, however, includes a provision requiring the DOE to “submit an annual report summarizing its progress toward siting another repository for TRU waste in a state other than New Mexico.”[12] The inference is that New Mexico—so far the only state hosting a deep geologic repository for nuclear waste disposal—would like to see the federal government take steps toward establishing another such facility in a different state.
Community Consent
The long and, at times, arduous journey to open the WIPP facility was supported by the residents of Carlsbad. The local communities have experienced economic benefits that the WIPP facility has provided to the area, both during the construction phase and through the course of its operations. Today, WIPP provides around 1,700 jobs in New Mexico.[13]
The WIPP project did face opposition from individuals in New Mexico, some New Mexico state government officials, some members of Congress, and various environmental groups. A 1981 lawsuit by the state led to negotiations between it and DOE resulting in a settlement agreement with provisions the state wanted the DOE to abide by. The WIPP Land Withdrawal Act of 1992, among other provisions, gave the state the authority to regulate mixed waste operations at WIPP under the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act.[14]
While WIPP is currently the only operating deep geologic repository for nuclear waste in the world, it is not likely to remain so for very long. Finland has been building a repository for its commercial SNF for years now, which is close to beginning disposal operations.[15] Sweden is not too far behind, while Canada is close to selecting its preferred site.[16] One common element to each program is that they are based on the consent of the local community.
If the WIPP experience is any indication of how long it takes to site, license, and build a deep geologic repository, it may be another 25 years before the United States sees another such facility in operation. However, this assumes that the federal government is actively working toward siting a new disposal facility—which is not the case. Whenever the effort to host another deep geologic repository gets underway, state and local officials will, at the very least, have one operating facility in the United States to visit in order to learn more about the associated risks and benefits. Likely in the not-too-distant future, there will also be other operating repositories around the world for those state and local officials to visit.
[3] Chuck McCutcheon, Nuclear Reactions: The Politics of Opening a Radioactive Waste Disposal Site (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 2002), ix.
Reuters recently reported that, for the first time, the Government of India will invite private companies to invest in nuclear electricity projects to ramp up growth in this...
Today, Kairos Power announced that it has signed an agreement[1] with the United States Department of Energy (DOE) to support the development of the company’s fluoride high-temperature test...
In 2022, European Union nuclear and hydro generation dropped by 118 terawatt-hours (TWh) and 71 TWh, respectively, preventing gas-fired generation from dropping and contributing to the gas crisis....
Poland’s nascent nuclear energy program is advancing: in late September, Polskie Elektrownie Jądrowe (PEJ), the utility tasked with constructing the country’s first nuclear plant by the Polish Ministry...
Nuclear power is being weighed in energy transition plans around the world, as countries seek to replace fossil fuels with low-carbon alternatives while also meeting growing energy demand and maintaining reliability and affordability.
While the United States (US) has facilities that can and do dispose of most low-level nuclear waste (LLW), it does not yet have a viable disposal pathway for two categories of waste: so-called greater-than-class-c (GTCC) nuclear waste, and nuclear waste with characteristics similar to it, or “GTCC-like.”
