The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission's (NRC's) regulations that set standards for protection of the public against radiation do not currently contain specific requirements for the control of solid materials with small or no amounts of radioactivity. Absent a National standard, NRC routinely evaluates, on a case-by-case basis, licensee requests to release solid materials when they are obsolete or no longer useful during operations, or when the facility is being shut down during decommissioning. As part of its continuing examination regarding the control of solid materials, NRC sponsored and received a report from the National Academies' (NA's) National Research Council that reviewed technical bases, policies, and precedents, and made several recommendations for moving forward on this issue. NRC evaluated the NA report and developed a set of options for proceeding with a process for examining approaches for control of solid materials. This paper explains the option that NRC chose and summarizes NRC's technical basis development and related National and international activities.