A Department of Energy fee that costs nuclear power utilities some $750 million a year should be suspended because a nuclear-waste program the fee is designed to pay for does not exist, opponents said in a new court filing.
The National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners and the Nuclear Energy Institute, a policy organization for the industry, urged a Washington DC appeals court to order the DOE to stop collecting the fee for the federally mandated Nuclear Waste Fund which grows by about $1 billion a year and is expected to total $28.3 billion by the end of fiscal 2012.
The fund was intended to pay for the development and maintenance of a planned repository for nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain in Nevada, a long-delayed program that was effectively killed when the Obama administration cut off funding and support for it.
The White House initiative prompted NARUC and NEI to sue in March this year, arguing that the fee, which has been in effect since 1983, should be suspended because there was no justification for it.
In their latest legal brief, filed on Oct. 20, and released by NARUC on Monday, the petitioners substantiate their claims that the DOE's determination in December 2010 to leave the fee unchanged is not in compliance with the 1982 Nuclear Waste Policy Act, which requires the department to regularly assess whether the fees are too high, too low, or necessary at all.
"Rather than complying with the NWPA requirement to annually evaluate the costs of the nuclear waste disposal program and determine whether the fees that have been and are being collected from ratepayers and utilities offset those costs, DOE has concluded that it must continue collecting the same fee it has been collecting since 1983 because it cannot determine that too much or too little revenue is being collected," the brief said.
Spokespeople for the department did not immediately return a phone call seeking comment.
In an earlier attempt to get relief for nuclear utilities and their ratepayers, NARUC in September urged the court to force the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to make a decision on whether spent fuel can be safely stored at Yucca Mountain. NARUC accused the NRC of having no intention of making a decision on the issue.
In the latest filing, NARUC and NEI accuse the DOE of ignoring the size of the fund, the costs of the program it is intended to pay for, and the revenues already collected to pay those costs.
A brief filed earlier by DOE fails to mention that it would continue to collect more than $750 million a year from the fee, which charges utilities one tenth of a cent per kilowatt hour of nuclear energy produced, the petitioners say. They also accuse the department of ignoring the annual $1 billion in interest earned by the fund each year in addition to ratepayer fees.
The petitioners also charge DOE with failing to explain why it changed its justification for leaving the fee unchanged. After saying in 2009 that the fee was "essential" to meeting the federal government's obligations to dispose of nuclear waste, Energy Secretary Stephen Chu said in November 2010 that there was no reasonable basis to conclude that the levy was either too high or too low, the new brief said.
Read more about the controversy over the Yucca mountain site on AOL Energy here.
The National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners and the Nuclear Energy Institute, a policy organization for the industry, urged a Washington DC appeals court to order the DOE to stop collecting the fee for the federally mandated Nuclear Waste Fund which grows by about $1 billion a year and is expected to total $28.3 billion by the end of fiscal 2012.
The fund was intended to pay for the development and maintenance of a planned repository for nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain in Nevada, a long-delayed program that was effectively killed when the Obama administration cut off funding and support for it.
The White House initiative prompted NARUC and NEI to sue in March this year, arguing that the fee, which has been in effect since 1983, should be suspended because there was no justification for it.
In their latest legal brief, filed on Oct. 20, and released by NARUC on Monday, the petitioners substantiate their claims that the DOE's determination in December 2010 to leave the fee unchanged is not in compliance with the 1982 Nuclear Waste Policy Act, which requires the department to regularly assess whether the fees are too high, too low, or necessary at all.
"Rather than complying with the NWPA requirement to annually evaluate the costs of the nuclear waste disposal program and determine whether the fees that have been and are being collected from ratepayers and utilities offset those costs, DOE has concluded that it must continue collecting the same fee it has been collecting since 1983 because it cannot determine that too much or too little revenue is being collected," the brief said.
Spokespeople for the department did not immediately return a phone call seeking comment.
In an earlier attempt to get relief for nuclear utilities and their ratepayers, NARUC in September urged the court to force the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to make a decision on whether spent fuel can be safely stored at Yucca Mountain. NARUC accused the NRC of having no intention of making a decision on the issue.
In the latest filing, NARUC and NEI accuse the DOE of ignoring the size of the fund, the costs of the program it is intended to pay for, and the revenues already collected to pay those costs.
A brief filed earlier by DOE fails to mention that it would continue to collect more than $750 million a year from the fee, which charges utilities one tenth of a cent per kilowatt hour of nuclear energy produced, the petitioners say. They also accuse the department of ignoring the annual $1 billion in interest earned by the fund each year in addition to ratepayer fees.
The petitioners also charge DOE with failing to explain why it changed its justification for leaving the fee unchanged. After saying in 2009 that the fee was "essential" to meeting the federal government's obligations to dispose of nuclear waste, Energy Secretary Stephen Chu said in November 2010 that there was no reasonable basis to conclude that the levy was either too high or too low, the new brief said.
Read more about the controversy over the Yucca mountain site on AOL Energy here.
Installations of wind farms with less than 20 megawatts of capacity may rise to a record this year if lawmakers expand a federal tax credit.
Two big wind development projects on Appalachian ridges in Bedford and Clearfield counties have been canceled, and fewer new turbines will be spinning across the nation next year due to the possible end of a federal tax credit program that has driven development.
The world's most efficient solar cells, a new vaccine against chicken cholera and recycling car tyres to make steel are among the five winning inventions at the inaugural Australian Collaborative Innovation Awards.