Analysis of Ignition Testing on K-West Basin Fuel

Technical Report · Tue Aug 10 04:00:00 EDT 1999

DOI:https://doi.org/10.2172/9534· OSTI ID:9534

Abrefah, J ^[1]; Huang, F H; Gerry, W M; Gray, W J; Marschman, S C; Thornton, T A

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1. PNNL

Approximately 2100 metric tons of spent nuclear fuel (SNF) discharged from the N-Reactor have been stored underwater at the K-Basins in the 100 Area of the Hanford Site. The spent fuel has been stored in the K-East Basin since 1975 and in the K-West Basin since 1981. Some of the SNF elements in these basins have corroded because of various breaches in the Zircaloy cladding that occurred during fuel discharge operations and/or subsequent handling and storage in the basins. Consequently, radioactive material in the fuel has been released into the basin water, and water has leaked from the K-East Basin into the soil below. To protect the Columbia River, which is only 380 m from the basins, the SNF is scheduled to be removed and transported for interim dry storage in the 200 East Area, in the central portion of the Site. However, before being shipped, the corroded fuel elements will be loaded into Multi-Canister OverPacks and conditioned. The conditioning process will be selected based on the Integrated Process Strategy (IPS) (WHC 1995), which was prepared on the basis of the dry storage concept developed by the Independent Technical Assessment (ITA) team (ITA 1994).

• Research Organization: Pacific Northwest National Lab., Richland, WA (US)
• Sponsoring Organization: US Department of Energy (US)
• DOE Contract Number: AC06-76RL01830
• OSTI ID: 9534
• Report Number(s): PNNL-11816; UC-602; UC-602
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

11 NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE AND FUEL MATERIALS
CORROSION
DRY STORAGE
FUEL ELEMENTS
FUEL STORAGE POOLS
HANFORD RESERVATION
MATERIALS TESTING
SAFETY ANALYSIS
SPENT FUEL STORAGE