Idaho spent nuclear fuel facility receives design approval

The Department of Energy's Office of Environmental Management has announced that its Idaho Cleanup Project (ICP) recently received department approval for the conceptual design for a spent nuclear fuel staging facility project at Idaho National Laboratory.

According to DOE-EM, the facility will ensure INL has sufficient capacity for safe storage of spent fuel and supports the department in meeting its obligations to the state of Idaho under the 1995 Idaho Settlement Agreement. That agreement set deadlines for the DOE to transfer spent fuel from wet to dry storage and prepare the fuel for eventual removal to a geologic disposal facility or interim storage site.

The facility will provide the ICP with sufficient near- and long-term storage capacity to support this work, DOE-EM said.

Located at the Idaho Nuclear Technology and Engineering Center (INTEC), the project is expected to be completed between 2030 and 2032. When finished, the estimated 15,000-square-foot staging facility will be capable of storing 25 storage overpacks containing transportable spent fuel casks generated from spent fuel packaging activities.

DOE's approval of the facility design "underscores ICP's commitment to safely fulfilling our obligations to the state of Idaho," said Nick Balsmeier, acting ICP manager. "I'm grateful to ICP contractor Idaho Environmental Coalition for their support and focus on advancing our critical mission."

Additional SNF: Last month, DOE-EM announced that crews at INTEC have received all 10 spent nuclear fuel shipments for the current fiscal year from INL's Advanced Test Reactor. INTEC has received ATR spent fuel for storage since the reactor became operational in 1967.

For most of the last 59 years, the fuel was placed in INTEC's large storage pool. However, starting in 2019, ATR fuel casks have been received, dried, and placed into dry storage at INTEC's Irradiated Fuel Storage Facility, in compliance with the 1995 settlement agreement.

According to DOE-EM, this work is part of a long-standing effort by the ICP to ensure the safe, long-term storage of spent fuel and support INL's research mission.