The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) has specified $20 million to conduct detailed siting studies for public or commercial entities interested in hosting DOE’s Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP) facilities. Entities could qualify to receive up to $5 million per site.
DOE is seeking expressions of interest to obtain input from the U.S. and international nuclear industry on the feasibility of accelerating development and deployment of advanced recycling technologies by proceeding with commercial scale demonstration facilities, specifically a Consolidated Fuel Treatment Facility and an Advanced Burner Reactor.
The DOE's Office of Environmental Management (EM) has also awarded 12 contracts totaling $3.3 million to support the development of technologies that have the potential to reduce cleanup costs and increase the safety and efficiency of treating and disposing of radioactive waste.
The contracts provide funding to small and large businesses and a university to develop technologies over a six month period.
The contractors and the focus of their advanced remediation technology work include: one university: the University of Texas for strontium immobilization in groundwater; four small businesses: ARES Corporation for single-shell heel removal, TMR Associates for tank heel removal, North Wind for subsurface characterization, and Commodore Advanced Sciences, Inc., for metals separation; and five businesses: Cogema Inc., (two awards) for cold crucible induction melter and tank waste alumina recovery, THOR Treatment Technologies for treatment of Hanford and Savannah River site high level waste, Parsons Inc., (two awards) for cesium removal and aluminum and chromium removal, Gas Technology Institute for submerged combustion melting, and ARCADIS G&M Inc., for groundwater remediation.
GNEP, launched earlier this year as part of the President’s Advanced Energy Initiative, aims to expand the use of nuclear energy to address the growing demand for energy. GNEP proposes private-public-international partnerships to develop advanced technologies to recycle used nuclear fuel, reduce wastes, and avoid misuse of nuclear materials.
Based on international and private sector response to GNEP, the Energy Department believes there are advanced technologies available to recycle used nuclear fuel that may be ready for deployment in conjunction with those currently under development by DOE. In light of this information, DOE is investigating the feasibility of accelerating development and deployment of advanced recycling technologies by proceeding with commercial demonstrations of the technologies.