POLICY NRC to add new items to categorical exclusions list.

POLICY

NRC to add new items to categorical exclusions list

19h ago Nuclear News

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has identified five categories of action to add to its list of categorical exclusions to reduce its documentation work under National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) procedures.

These revisions are included in the final rule, “Categorical exclusions from environmental review,” which was published in the Federal Register on March 30. The final rule will become effective on April 29.

“Revisions to the categorical exclusions will (1) clarify and address inconsistencies in the application of categorical exclusions across licensing and regulatory programs and (2) eliminate the need to prepare EAs [environmental assessments] for NRC regulatory actions that have no significant effect on the human environment,” the final rule’s regulatory analysis states.

The new additions: According to the FR notice, the NRC’s categorical exclusions include “administrative, organizational, and procedural amendments to certain types of NRC regulations, licenses, and certificates; minor changes related to application filing procedures; certain personnel and procurement activities; and activities for which environmental review by the NRC is excluded by statute.”

Below are the five new categorical exclusions:

• Actions that are administrative, procedural, or solely financial in nature, including exemptions and orders pertaining to these actions.
• Amendments to 10 CFR 72.214, “List of approved spent fuel storage casks,” for new, amended, revised, or renewed certificates of compliance for cask designs used for spent fuel storage.
• Approvals provided for under the requirements of 10 CFR 50.55a, “Codes and standards.”
• Certain changes to requirements for fire protection, emergency planning, physical security, cybersecurity, and quality assurance.
• Changes to extend implementation dates of certain new NRC requirements that were previously found to not result in an environmental impact.

Background: NEPA requires federal agencies to assess the environmental impact of some of their actions prior to deciding whether to move forward. Each action falls under one of three categories: categorical exclusion (for actions with no significant environmental impact), environmental assessment (EA), and environmental impact statement (EIS). If the agency believes an action is not likely to cause a significant impact on the environment, the submission of an EA is required. If the agency believes the environmental impact of an action is significant, the more comprehensive EIS must be submitted.

If it is determined that something in a given category has no significant effect on the environment, then the agency can establish a categorical exclusion for that item.

The NRC published an advance notice of proposed rulemaking on May 7, 2021, after an NRC review of its environmental programs and organization identified potential opportunities to add, remove, or enhance its list of exclusions. A public comment opportunity elicited more than 2,300 comments, most of them duplicates. According to the FR notice, the NRC evaluated and considered 20 comments during the drafting of the proposed rule that was ultimately published on July 2, 2024.

Other revisions: Along with the new additions, NRC staff will eliminate two existing categorical exclusions that are no longer necessary because they are obsolete. It will also reorganize the list of categorical exclusions to “eliminate redundancy, add clarity, and improve consistency and efficiency.” This reorganization would eliminate some overlapping actions and consolidate others.

By reducing the number of required environmental assessments and requests for additional information, the final rule could save about 1,030 staff hours per year over the next 10 years, according to the NRC’s regulatory analysis.

[decomm_wkg] GAO: Clarification of HLW definition could save DOE billions

WASTE MANAGEMENT

GAO: Clarification of HLW definition could save DOE billions

Tue, Mar 31, 2026, 10:29AM Nuclear News

A photo from inside the AX-101 underground waste tank at the DOE’s Hanford Site in Washington. (Photo: DOE)

A clearer definition of what constitutes high-level radioactive waste could save the Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management “tens of billions of dollars” in waste management costs and accelerate its cleanup schedule by decades, according to a report by the U.S. Government Accountability Office.

DOE-EM’s efforts to manage waste resulting from legacy spent nuclear fuel reprocessing have been hindered for decades by the ambiguity of the statutory definition of HLW as laid out in the Atomic Energy Act and Nuclear Waste Policy Act, the report states. While admitting that the DOE has taken steps to overcome this ambiguity, the GAO says that the department has not fully evaluated all available opportunities to treat and dispose of waste more economically as either transuranic or low-level radioactive waste.

“By systematically evaluating these opportunities and pursuing them to the maximum extent possible, [DOE-EM] could accelerate its cleanup mission and save at least tens of billions of dollars,” the GAO report says.

The report, Nuclear Waste Cleanup: Clarifying Definition of High-Level Radioactive Waste Could Help DOE Save Tens of Billions of Dollars (GAO-26-108018), was published on March 25.

Recommendations: Acknowledging the complexity of the issue and the implications that revising the statutory definition of HLW could have, the GAO suggests that Congress consider convening a panel of experts to recommend specific revisions to the HLW definition to address any ambiguities.

The GAO is also recommending a Blue Ribbon Commission comprising a group of relevant experts from, for example, key agencies, industry, and academia who could develop and recommend specific revisions to the definition of HLW in the AEA and NWPA and report these recommendations to Congress within 12 months.

The GAO also recommends that DOE-EM “systematically evaluate opportunities to treat and dispose of certain waste associated with reprocessing as something other than HLW and communicate to Congress regarding its efforts to implement these opportunities as well as actions Congress can take to minimize or eliminate any barriers impeding [DOE-EM’s] ability to pursue them.”

In response to the report, the DOE agreed with the GAO’s recommendations.

The tools at hand: The GAO report notes that DOE-EM has three main classification tools it can use to determine that certain waste associated with reprocessing is not HLW:

• The Waste Incidental to Reprocessing evaluation, as outlined in DOE Manual 435.1-1.
• Section 3116 of the Ronald W. Reagan National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal year 2005.
• The DOE’s 2019 HLW interpretation, which was incorporated into DOE Manual 435.1-1.

“While the tools provide [DOE-EM] with formal requirements and a process for clarifying which waste is not HLW and may be safely treated and disposed of as non-HLW, the three tools have shortcomings that impede [DOE-EM’s] ability to progress with its cleanup of certain waste streams,” the report states.

Specifically, the GAO finds that the three classification tools do not provide a consistent radioactive threshold at which waste is considered HLW; do not fully apply at the DOE sites involved in cleaning up reprocessing waste (the Hanford and Savannah River Sites, Idaho National Laboratory, and the West Valley Demonstration Project); and can be an expensive and extensive process to use, leading to delays.

In addition, the GAO report states that the lack of clarity in the definition of HLW has left DOE-EM vulnerable to lawsuits when applying the classification tools. This includes risks posed by the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2024 ruling overturning the Chevron doctrine. That decision may put the department in greater litigation risk, as courts may no longer defer to the DOE’s interpretation of the AEA and NWPA regarding what constitutes HLW, simply because the law is ambiguous.

Lancaster County to get Pa. funds for Three Mile Island emergency planning

Lancaster County to get Pa. funds for Three Mile Island emergency planning

• TOM LISI | Staff Writer      Mar 24, 2026

Constellation Energy Corp. hopes to restart Crane Clean Energy Center, formerly Three Mile Island’s Unit 1 reactor, to supply Microsoft data centers with low-carbon energy.SUZETTE WENGER | Staff Photographer

• Facebook
• 
  
• Twitter
• 
  
• Email
• 
  
• Print

With the Three Mile Island Unit 1 nuclear reactor slated to reopen next year, Lancaster County is set to receive additional state funding for nuclear emergency response planning.

The Board of Commissioners on Wednesday is set to approve a $36,500 grant from the Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency to help cover the salary of a response manager who is updating the county’s response plans to a nuclear disaster for the Lancaster County Emergency Management Division.

The Lancaster County Salary Board approved the creation of the radiological planner position in October.

The plans include “everything from how we communicate and notify people, as well as to how we’re going to evacuate people, so we have somebody specifically focused on rebuilding all of that from the ground up,” Department of Public Safety Director Brian Pasquale said.

In 2024, Constellation Energy announced plans to reopen Unit 1 of the Three Mile Island facility and gave it a new name — Crane Clean Energy Center. The sole customer for the facility’s 835 megawatts of expected output is Microsoft, which has signed a 20-year agreement to buy power for its growing network of data centers.

---

READ NEXT: An inside look at reopening Three Mile Island’s nuclear plant expected in 2027

---

In December, Constellation Chief Executive Joe Dominguez said he expects the facility to be operational in the summer of 2027, a year earlier than initially planned. He said its opening will come at a pivotal time to “power this important revolution in AI.”

Unit 2 has remained closed since its partial meltdown in 1979, and its owner, Energy Solutions, in the process of decommissioning the reactor.

Unit 1 remained in operation until 2019, when Constellation closed it, citing cost concerns.

On Monday, Lancaster County’s emergency preparedness team held its first tabletop exercise related to the reopening of the Three Mile Island site, Pasquale said at Tuesday’s commissioners work session.

Tabletop exercises are a planning tool to game out specific real-world scenarios to put plans and procedures to the test in a low-stakes environment.

The PEMA dollars for the county comes from the Radiological Emergency Response Program, funded by fees assessed to nuclear operators.

Amazon-backed nuclear reactor group X-energy files for IPO

https://www.ft.com/content/22d28650-5536-4446-92ba-b094f56d13fa?syn-25a6b1a6=1

Please use the sharing tools found via the share button at the top or side of articles. Copying articles to share with others is a breach of FT.com T&Cs and Copyright Policy. Email licensing@ft.com to buy additional rights. Subscribers may share up to 10 or 20 articles per month using the gift article service. More information can be found on the Help FAQ on gift articles. 
https://www.ft.com/content/22d28650-5536-4446-92ba-b094f56d13fa?accessToken=zwAAAZ0RIdH8kc8i0oZQVTZERtOSurCU9W0T-g.MEYCIQCJAlAtyPnSe1M8ahdpOWpbbnTlSl4-cPvX558y71uEkwIhAKn7ZawxcGl3XFTWNnW37Ih7uCAZm9bq1Bm9lAIfsQa4&sharetype=gift&token=bd04783d-20e1-4f2d-85d8-1e166aa8002d&syn-25a6b1a6=1

An Amazon-backed small modular nuclear reactor company is filing for an initial public offering amid rising investor interest in nuclear energy. X-energy submitted a draft registration statement to the Securities and Exchange Commission on Friday, putting it on track to go public sometime in the early summer. The IPO would be the latest for developers of small modular nuclear reactors, which have been touted as a potential solution for rapid electricity demand growth caused largely by data centres, but also the electrification of cars and household appliances. According to data from BloombergNEF, US data centre power demand is set to climb from 34.7 gigawatts in 2024 to 106GW by 2035. X-energy is building an SMR that uses helium as a coolant instead of water, the industry standard. Supplies of helium have been severely disrupted by the effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz amid the Iran war, pushing up commercial prices. “Spot helium prices could spike by 50 per cent to 200 per cent in severe shortage scenarios,” according to Fitch analysts. Amazon backed the company in October 2024, anchoring a $400mn fundraising round along with Citadel’s Ken Griffin. The ecommerce giant took two seats on the company’s board. In November X-energy completed a $700mn fundraising round led by Jane Street, ARK Invest, Galvanize, Hood River Capital Management, Point 72, Reaves Asset Management and XTX Ventures. In addition to Amazon, it has secured contracts with FTSE 100-listed Centrica and Dow. While X-energy has not received full approval from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to build its reactor, in February the agency licensed the company to make nuclear fuel for advanced reactors at a facility in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. X-energy declined to state how much it is seeking to raise, or how its shares would be priced. JPMorgan, Morgan Stanley, Jefferies and Moelis and Company are acting as the lead bookrunners. X-energy would be the fourth publicly traded SMR company, following Nano Nuclear, NuScale Energy and Sam Altman-backed Oklo. Oklo’s stock price has gained 94 per cent over the past year. But Nano and NuScale have lost ground, falling 32 and 27 per cent respectively. Recommended The Big Read The cost of America’s nuclear revival The filing comes as Wall Street investment bankers are gearing up for a series of potentially huge listings later this year. Elon Musk’s rocket group SpaceX and AI start-ups Anthropic and OpenAI have all indicated plans to go public at some point in 2026. Each of the three deals is expected to raise tens of billions of dollars in proceeds, potentially outstripping the total haul from about 200 US IPOs in 2025. Market volatility triggered by the war in Iran could yet scupper bankers’ pipeline, however, just as the economic turmoil sparked by President Donald Trump’s so-called liberation day tariffs last April put several large US tech listings on pause.

(Arnie Gundersen)

Nuclear's cleanup cost threatens the expansion dream

Countries are racing to build new reactors. But we've barely figured out how to clean up the old ones — and the bill is potentially staggering. 

https://www.dw.com/en/nuclears-cleanup-cost-threatens-the-expansion-dream/a-76431361

(Arnie Gundersen)

Safety meltdown: Trump’s weakening of nuclear reactor regulations sparks opposition

The Morning Star, about AGs and others' opposition to the weakening of nuclear regulations.

https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/safety-meltdown-trumps-weakening-nuclear-reactor-regulations-sparks-opposition

NRC considers eliminating half-century-old radiation standard - E&E News by POLITICO

NRC considers eliminating half-century-old radiation standard - E&E News by POLITICO https://share.google/eQBkPZxBR5nh11tx1