Determination of cost-effective receipt rates for an MRS and the repository

Conference · Tue Oct 01 04:00:00 EDT 1991

OSTI ID:5786377

McKee, R W; Huber, H D; Short, S M

This paper describes results of a comprehensive logistics and cost analysis to determine if there are potential benefits to the US high-level waste management system for spent fuel receipt rates to a Monitored Retrievable Storage (MRS) facility or the repository other than the current 3000 MTU/yr design-basis receipt rate. Cases considering repository startup dates of 2010 and 2015 and MRS startup dates of 1998 and 3 years prior to the repository have been evaluated, and receipt rates ranging from 1500 to 6000 MTU/yr have been considered for both the MRS and the repository. Higher receipt rates appear to be economically justified for both the repository and an MRS. For a repository-only system, minimum costs are found at a repository receipt rate of 6000 MTU/yr. When a storage-only MRS is included in the system, minimum system costs are also achieved at a repository receipt rate of 6000 MTU/yr. However, the MRS receipt rate for minimum system costs, which ranges between 3500 and 6000 MTU/yr, depends on both the MRS startup date and whether or not the storage capacity of the MRS it constrained. With a 1998 unconstrained MRS and a 2010 repository, the added cost of providing the MRS is offset by at-reactor storage cost reductions, and the total system cost of $10.1 billion is only slightly higher than that for the repository-only system. If the MRS storage capacity is constrained to a maximum of 15,000 MTU, then this cost increases to $10.4 billion.

• Research Organization: Pacific Northwest Lab., Richland, WA (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: DOE; USDOE, Washington, DC (United States)
• DOE Contract Number: AC06-76RL01830
• OSTI ID: 5786377
• Report Number(s): PNL-SA-19166; CONF-911040--10; ON: DE92006961
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

051000* -- Nuclear Fuels-- Economic
Industrial
& Business Aspects
052002 -- Nuclear Fuels-- Waste Disposal & Storage
11 NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE AND FUEL MATERIALS
12 MANAGEMENT OF RADIOACTIVE AND NON-RADIOACTIVE WASTES FROM NUCLEAR FACILITIES
ACCOUNTING
COMPARATIVE EVALUATIONS
COMPUTER CODES
COST BENEFIT ANALYSIS
ECONOMIC ANALYSIS
ECONOMICS
ENERGY SOURCES
EVALUATION
FUELS
MANAGEMENT
MATERIALS
MATHEMATICAL MODELS
MONITORED RETRIEVABLE STORAGE
NUCLEAR FUELS
RADIOACTIVE WASTE DISPOSAL
RADIOACTIVE WASTE MANAGEMENT
RADIOACTIVE WASTE STORAGE
REACTOR MATERIALS
S CODES
SPENT FUEL STORAGE
SPENT FUELS
STORAGE
TRANSPORT
W CODES
WASTE DISPOSAL
WASTE MANAGEMENT
WASTE STORAGE