The Nuclear Regulatory Commission will
issue a construction permit for a facility dedicated to producing medical isotopes, a facility the NRC calls the first of its kind.
SHINE Medical Technologies submitted the first part of its application
for a construction permit on March 26, 2013, and the second part on May 31,
2013.
The NRC review process included environmental
impacts and the examination of the preliminary design for the SHINE facility. An
independent review of SHINE’s preliminary safety analysis report was conducted
by the NRC’s Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards. On Oct. 15, 2015, the committee recommended that the commission issue the construction permit to SHINE.
This is going to be the first time since
1985 that the NRC is issuing a construction permit for either a production facility or
a nonpower utilization plant.
SHINE will produce molybdenum-99
(Mo-99) and other radioisotopes. Mo-99 is used in medicine to produce
technetium- 99m, an isotope used in millions of diagnostic procedures in
the U.S. annually.
The facility will be located in
Janesville, Wisconsin. There has not been any
commercial production of Mo-99 in the country since 1989.
