The Nuclear Regulatory Commission is amending its regulations to reflect the licensing, inspection and annual fees it will charge its applicants and licensees for fiscal year (FY) 2009.The agency is required by Congress to recover for the U.S. Treasury most of its annual appropriated budget through two types of fees. One is for specific NRC services, such as licensing and inspection activities. This fee is calculated using the current hourly rate multiplied by the time spent by staff performing a service. The other is an annual fee paid by licensees, which recovers generic regulatory expenses and other costs not recovered through fees for specific services. These fees are contained in NRC regulations 10 CFR Part 170 (fees for license-specific services) and 10 CFR Part 171 (annual fees). These fees are paid to the NRC and transferred to the U.S. Treasury’s general fund.
By law, the NRC must recover, through fees to applicants and licensees, 90 percent of its budget authority for FY 2009 (Oct. 1, 2008 - Sept. 30, 2009), less the amounts appropriated from the Nuclear Waste Fund for high-level radioactive waste activities and from general funds for waste-incidental-to-reprocessing and generic homeland security activities. The total amount of fees to be recovered by Sept. 30 is approximately $870.6 million, about $91.5 million more than in FY 2008.
The FY 2009 fee rule, published today in the Federal Register, includes fees based upon the Omnibus Appropriations Act, 2009. Approximately one third of the fees will be billed for specific services (Part 170) and the remaining two thirds will be billed to annual fees (Part 171). The hourly rate for Part 170 activities increases about 8 percent from $238 to $257 per hour. The increase in FY 2009 fees is due primarily to an increase in reactor license renewals and new uranium enrichment and recovery licensing activities. The NRC decreased fees for small entities in FY 2009.
The FY 2009 annual fees are categorized by types of licensees/applicants and include the following:
Class/Category FY 2009 Annual Fee
Operating Power Reactors
(including Spent Fuel Storage/Reactor Decommissioning annual fee) . . $4,625,000
Spent Fuel Storage/Reactor Decommissioning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . $122,000Test and Research Reactors (Non-power Reactors) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . $87,600
High-Enriched Uranium Fuel Facility . . . . . . . . . . ... . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . $4,691,000
Low-Enriched Uranium Fuel Facility . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . $1,649,000
UF6 Conversion Facility . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .... . . . . . . . . . . $969,000
Conventional Mills . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ... . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . $31,200
Typical Materials Users:Radiographers . . .. . . . . . ... . . . . . . . . . . . . . . $22,700
Well Loggers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . $9,700Industrial Gauges (Category 1C) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .... . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . $2,700
Broad Scope Medical (Category 7B) . . . . . . . . . . . . . .... . . . . . . . . ... . . . $36,300
NRC estimates that the FY 2009 annual fees will be paid by 104 nuclear power plant licensees, 4 non-power reactors, 19 spent fuel storage/reactor-in-decommissioning facilities, 11 fuel cycle facilities, 7 uranium recovery facilities and approximately 3,800 material licensees. (NRC)
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