Skip to main content

GNEP Grant Awardees Announced

From DOE:
The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) today announced that 11 commercial and public consortia have been selected to receive up to $16 million in grants, subject to negotiation, to conduct detailed siting studies for integrated spent fuel recycling facilities under the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP) initiative. DOE will award the grants early next year after negotiations are completed with prospective awardees.

“As our economy grows so will the need for reliable, emissions-free energy generation. Nuclear energy can help meet that need and GNEP can do it in a way that maximizes the benefit of nuclear fuel while minimizing the risk of nuclear proliferation,” DOE Assistant Secretary for Nuclear Energy Dennis Spurgeon said. “That is why we are pleased that so many communities across the country are interested in hosting the initial facilities necessary to support this exciting project. These selections are an important initial step in proceeding to evaluate and select locations to host GNEP facilities.”

Of the 11 sites located throughout the country, six are currently owned and operated by DOE. The study sites and sponsors are:

1. Atomic City, ID, EnergySolutions, LLC

2. Barnwell, SC, EnergySolutions, LLC

3. Hanford Site, WA, Columbia Basin Consulting Group/Tri-City Industrial Development Council

4. Hobbs, NM, Eddy Lea Energy Alliance

5. Idaho National Laboratory, ID Regional Development Alliance, Inc.

6. Morris, IL, General Electric Company

7. Oak Ridge National Laboratory, TN, Community Reuse Organization of East Tennessee

8. Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant, KY, Paducah Uranium Plant Asset Utilization, Inc.

9. Portsmouth Gaseous Diffusion Plant, OH, Piketon Initiative for Nuclear Independence, LLC

10. Roswell, NM, EnergySolutions, LLC

11. Savannah River National Laboratory, SC, Economic Development Partnership of Aiken and Edgefield Counties

The grantees will perform detailed siting studies related to hosting one or both of the Consolidated Fuel Treatment Center and the Advanced Burner Reactor. The subsequent awards will be for a 90-day period of performance to complete a detailed site characterization study of each sponsored site. Congress provided up to $20 million in FY 2006 for integrated spent fuel recycling facilities siting studies. The remaining funds will be held in reserve to potentially fund supplemental activities if required.
Congratulations to all the awardees. And if the name Energy Solutions sounds familiar, there's a reason why.

Technorati tags: , , , , , , ,

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Wednesday Update

From NEI’s Japan micro-site: NRC, Industry Concur on Many Post-Fukushima Actions Industry/Regulatory/Political Issues • There is a “great deal of alignment” between the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the industry on initial steps to take at America’s nuclear energy facilities in response to the nuclear accident in Japan, Charles Pardee, the chief operating officer of Exelon Generation Co., said at an agency briefing today. The briefing gave stakeholders an opportunity to discuss staff recommendations for near-term actions the agency may take at U.S. facilities. PowerPoint slides from the meeting are on the NRC website. • The International Atomic Energy Agency board has approved a plan that calls for inspectors to evaluate reactor safety at nuclear energy facilities every three years. Governments may opt out of having their country’s facilities inspected. Also approved were plans to maintain a rapid response team of experts ready to assist facility operators recoverin...

Fluor Invests in NuScale

You know, it’s kind of sad that no one is willing to invest in nuclear energy anymore. Wait, what? NuScale Power celebrated the news of its company-saving $30 million investment from Fluor Corp. Thursday morning with a press conference in Washington, D.C. Fluor is a design, engineering and construction company involved with some 20 plants in the 70s and 80s, but it has not held interest in a nuclear energy company until now. Fluor, which has deep roots in the nuclear industry, is betting big on small-scale nuclear energy with its NuScale investment. "It's become a serious contender in the last decade or so," John Hopkins, [Fluor’s group president in charge of new ventures], said. And that brings us to NuScale, which had run into some dark days – maybe not as dark as, say, Solyndra, but dire enough : Earlier this year, the Securities Exchange Commission filed an action against NuScale's lead investor, The Michael Kenwood Group. The firm "misap...

Activists' Claims Distort Facts about Advanced Reactor Design

Below is from our rapid response team . Yesterday, regional anti-nuclear organizations asked federal nuclear energy regulators to launch an investigation into what it claims are “newly identified flaws” in Westinghouse’s advanced reactor design, the AP1000. During a teleconference releasing a report on the subject, participants urged the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to suspend license reviews of proposed AP1000 reactors. In its news release, even the groups making these allegations provide conflicting information on its findings. In one instance, the groups cite “dozens of corrosion holes” at reactor vessels and in another says that eight holes have been documented. In all cases, there is another containment mechanism that would provide a barrier to radiation release. Below, we examine why these claims are unwarranted and why the AP1000 design certification process should continue as designated by the NRC. Myth: In the AP1000 reactor design, the gap between the shield bu...