Reinvestigation into Closure Predictions of Room D at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant
- Sandia National Lab. (SNL-NM), Albuquerque, NM (United States)
Room D was an in-situ, isothermal, underground experiment conducted at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant between 1984 and 1991. The room was carefully instrumented to measure the horizontal and vertical closure immediately upon excavation and for several years thereafter. Early finite element simulations of salt creep around Room D under-predicted the vertical closure by 4.5×, causing investigators to explore a series of changes to the way Room D was modeled. Discrepancies between simulations and measurements were resolved through a series of adjustments to model parameters, which were openly acknowledged in published reports. Interest in Room D has been rekindled recently by the U.S./German Joint Project III and Project WEIMOS, which seek to improve the predictions of rock salt constitutive models. Joint Project participants calibrate their models solely against laboratory tests, and benchmark the models against underground experiments, such as room D. This report describes updating legacy Room D simulations to today’s computational standards by rectifying several numerical issues. Subsequently, the constitutive model used in previous modeling is recalibrated two different ways against a suite of new laboratory creep experiments on salt extracted from the repository horizon of the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant. Simulations with the new, laboratory-based, calibrations under-predict Room D vertical closure by 3.1×. A list of potential improvements is discussed.
- Research Organization:
- Sandia National Lab. (SNL-NM), Albuquerque, NM (United States)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE Office of Nuclear Energy (NE), Fuel Cycle Technologies (NE-5). Used Fuel Disposition Campaign (UFDC)
- DOE Contract Number:
- AC04-94AL85000
- OSTI ID:
- 1333709
- Report Number(s):
- SAND2016-9665; 647799; TRN: US1700776
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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