Future Transition of WIPP from EM to Another DOE Office - 19256
- US DOE (United States)
The U. S. Department of Energy (DOE) Carlsbad Field Office (CBFO) has a primary mission to assist federal government entities disposition transuranic (TRU) radioactive waste. The main resource for disposition is the deep geologic repository known as the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP). Other resources include a complete transportation system and a program that assists in the certification and shipment of TRU waste to WIPP known as the National TRU Program (NTP). All of these resources are managed by CBFO, which currently is part of the DOE Environmental Management (EM) program. EM's primary mission for DOE is to clean up the legacy remaining from many years of nuclear weapons research and production. But, CBFO estimates the need for WIPP and NTP will continue beyond the mission of EM and will assist other entities such as the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), the Office of Science (OS) and the Navy. As the inventory of legacy TRU waste is reduced, the inventory of new TRU waste will continue from ongoing missions. So, over the life span of WIPP the primary customers of CBFO will shift from legacy EM sites to newly-generated TRU waste sites. And, somewhere along the way CBFO estimates that it will transition, primarily from an EM support (legacy waste) entity to a primarily a NNSA support (newly-generated waste) entity to facilitate ongoing DOE missions. This paper will address the need for that change at a programmatic level and will include some ideas for conceptual planning for such a transition. (author)
- Research Organization:
- WM Symposia, Inc., PO Box 27646, 85285-7646 Tempe, AZ (United States)
- OSTI ID:
- 23003019
- Report Number(s):
- INIS-US--21-WM-19256
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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