Integrating scientific results for a post-closure safety demonstration
- TRW Environmental Safety Systems, Inc., Vienna, VA (United States)
- TRW Environmental Safety Systems, Inc., Livermore, CA (United States)
- TRW Environmental Safety Systems, Inc., Las Vegas, NV (United States)
- Dept. of Energy, Washington, DC (United States)
The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) is developing a nuclear waste management system that will accept high-level radioactive waste, transport it, store it, and ultimately emplace it in a deep geologic repository. The key activity now is determining whether Yucca Mountain, Nevada is suitable as a site for the repository. If so, the crucial technological advance will be the demonstration that disposal of nuclear waste will be safe for thousands of years after closure. Recent regulatory, legal, and scientific developments imply that the safety demonstration must be simple. The scientific developments taken together support a simple set of hypotheses that constitute a post-closure safety argument for a repository at Yucca Mountain. If the understanding of Yucca Mountain hydrology presented in the Site Characterization Plan proves correct, then these hypotheses might be confirmed by combining results of Surface-Based Testing with early testing results in the Exploratory Studies Facility.
- Research Organization:
- American Society of Civil Engineers, New York, NY (United States); American Nuclear Society, La Grange Park, IL (United States)
- OSTI ID:
- 60797
- Report Number(s):
- CONF-940553--Vol.1
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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