Report on Waste Burial Charges: Changes in Decommissioning Waste Disposal Costs at Low-Level Waste Burial Facilities

摘要

A requirement placed upon nuclear power reactor licensees by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is that licensees must annually adjust the estimate of the cost of decommissioning their plants, in dollars of the current year, as part of the process to provide reasonable assurance that adequate funds for decommissioning will be available when needed. This report, which is revised periodically, explains the formula that is acceptable to the NRC for determining the minimum decommissioning fund requirements for nuclear power plants. The sources of information used in the formula are identified, and the values developed for the estimation of radioactive waste burial/disposition costs, by site and by year, are given. Licensees may use the formula, coefficients, and burial/disposition adjustment factors from this report in their cost analyses, or they may use adjustment factors derived from any methodology that results in a total cost estimate of no less than the amount estimated by using the parameters presented in this report. This report includes an alternative low-level waste (LLW) disposition option other than direct disposal at the two remaining full-service (Class A, B, and C) LLW disposal sites. This option, which is accepted as a valid approach for consideration by licensees, allows contracting with waste vendors to provide for the disposition of certain LLW generated during decommissioning.