On-Site Storage
Currently, all radioactive waste generated by U.S. reactors is stored at the reactor site - either in fuel pools or waste casks. However, the casks are currently security-vulnerable and should be "hardened" while a better solution continues to be sought.
.................................................................................................................................................................................................................
As reported by the Los Angeles Times.
The on-site storage of irradiated nuclear fuel at San Onofre, CA, and other permanently shut down and even decommissioned nuclear power plants, is a main focus of the article.
admin
Science Magazine published an article by researchers at Princeton University and the Union of Concerned Scientists warning that an irradiated nuclear fuel pool fire at nuclear power stations would be far more damaging than the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) analysis currently claims. The article’s principle author Princeton University’s Dr. Frank von Hippel and co-authors Princeton researcher Michael Schoeppner and Union of Concerned Scientists’ staff scientist Dr. Edwin Lyman argue that NRC inaction to re-evaluate the risk leaves extremely large populations of US citizens and the economy vulnerable to undue risk to a fire caused by an earthquake or an act of terrorism.
Following the refueling of every nuclear power plant, the highly-radioactive and thermally hot irradiated nuclear fuel must be taken out of the reactor core and moved into a large adjacent storage pond to shield against the radioactivity and constantly cool the nuclear waste. The loss of cooling water will cause the nuclear waste to overheat and catch fire. Because the irradiated nuclear fuel is stored outside of containment huge amounts of radioactivity would be liberated into the atmosphere and return as fallout.
The researchers’ analysis finds that a nuclear waste fire in the "spent" fuel pool could radioactively contaminate an area twice the size of New Jersey causing an average of 8 million people to indefinitely relocate and cause as much as $2 trillion in damages.
The researchers further find that the NRC analysis has played down the consequences because it has been “pressured by the nuclear industry, directly and through Congress, to low-ball the potential consequences of a fire,” to shield the nuclear industry from cost and liability.
The researchers' recent findings are corroborated by several studies including a National Academy of Sciences 2006 report to the NRC and Congress. “Safety and Security of Commercial Spent Nuclear Fuel Storage” identifies that nuclear waste at reactor storage ponds could be credibly attacked by terrorists causing offsite radioactive releases and harmful contamination out to 500 miles.
Beyond Nuclear supports a management policy for the cessation of production of nuclear waste and offloading the cooled waste from overcrowded pools into hardened onsite storage casks (HOSS). Low-density storage of the remaining hot nuclear waste in the cooling ponds until it can be transfered into casks greatly reduces the likelihood and consequences of a nuclear waste fire in the event of a drain down.
admin
As reported by WMUK. Beyond Nuclear is quoted:
Without something like Yucca Mountain, Kevin Kamps of Beyond Nuclear worries that these dumps won’t be temporary at all:
“The current top target in the country is Andrews County in Texas which is 40 percent Latin American, a high percentage of low-income residents. So it’s a real environmental justice issue. And it could just get stuck there on the surface and this material can’t stay on the surface forever. If it ever gets out into the environment - and erosion, weatherization would do that over time - then it would be a radiological disaster.”
Moving nuclear waste across the country to these dumps could be risky too - which is why Kamps says he’s not in favor of places like Yucca Mountain either.
Robert Alvarez of the Institute for Policy Studies has prepared a power point presentation (click here for .pptx version; click here for .pdf version) re: the many costs, risks, and liabilities of irradiated nuclear fuel "interim storage" -- most to all of which, the public will be burdened with.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has acknowledged that highly radioactive irradiated nuclear fuel remains hazardous for a million years. Thus, it must be kept isolated from the living environment for that entire time period. Otherwise, a catastrophe would unfold. This applies to "interim storage," whether on-site (in pools or dry casks) at the atomic reactors where it was generated in the first place, as well as to away-from-reactor storage, and even permanent disposal, sites.
As reported by Gregg Levine and Caroline Preston in The New Yorker.
The article discusses on-site storage of irradiated nuclear fuel, in indoor "wet" pools and outdoor dry casks, as at Entergy Nuclear's Pilgrim atomic reactor near Boston.
The article quotes Beyond Nuclear: One option is consolidated interim storage. Under this plan, the spent fuel would be moved from plants in thirty states to a handful of regional, aboveground storage facilities—what Kevin Kamps, a waste specialist at the watchdog Beyond Nuclear, has called “parking-lot dumps.”
