Part One of Two Parts
One of the major problems with U.S. nuclear power is dealing with the spent nuclear fuel from the reactors. Fuel for nuclear reactors typically spends about five years in a reactor during which time about five percent of the fissile material in the fuel is used up. By that time, byproducts of the fission reaction have accumulated to the point where the fuel must be replaced.
After removal from the reactor, the spent fuel spends about five years is the cooling pool while the heat and radiation have declined to the point where the spent fuel can be safely stored in steel and concreate dry casks either onsite with the reactor or at an interim storage facility. The dry casks are designed to last more than a hundred years if necessary.
Originally, the U.S. was supposed to have a permanent geological repository for spent nuclear fuel by 1999 in an old salt mine under Yucca Mountain in Nevada. The project was cancelled due to political opposition from the President and Nevada Congressmen in 2009 although there have been recent attempts by Congress to restart the project.
Now it appears that we won’t have a permanent geological repository until 2050 at the earliest. It will take that long to find a new site, review the environmental impact, and construct the facility. In the meantime, the cooling pools are filling up fast and something must be done with spent nuclear fuel assemblies in the cooling pools or the reactors will have to be shut down. Without a permanent geological repository, the only other choice is to put spent fuel assemblies in temporary storage consisting of steel and concrete dry casks.
At the end of last month, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) granted a license application from Holtec International for a proposed consolidated interim storage facility for spent nuclear fuel assemblies called HI-STORE CIS. The facility is to be built in southeastern New Mexico near Carlsbad. The spent nuclear fuel is to be stored there until we have a permanent geological repository or until we have fast reactors that can burn it or until we recycled it to extract plutonium to make new nuclear fuel.
The Oak Ridge National laboratory recently produced a report that said that an interim spent fuel repository would save the U.S. Treasury fifteen billion dollars by 2040, thirty billion dollars by 2050, and fifty four billion dollars by 2060.
Dry casks are usually constructed from one or more shells of steel, cast iron and reinforced concrete which prevents leaks and provides shielding of the radiation. Existing casks can hold about ten tons of spent fuel. Currently, thirty-five nuclear power plants in 24 states are licensed for dry cask storage.
HI-STORE CIS is an underground spent nuclear fuel storage system with a maximum capacity of ten thousand dry cask which can each hold about twelve tons of spent nuclear fuel. Phase one of the project is an initial forty-year license application for five hundred storage cavities which can hold a combined total of eight thousand five hundred metric tons of uranium which constitutes over ninety five percent of spent nuclear fuel. It is estimated that it will take ten years to construct the facility and employ about three hundred local workers.
Please read Part 2
