CURRENT TYPE B PACKAGE APPROVAL PROCEDURES IN GERMANY: SELECTED TOPICS FROM SAFETY ASSESSMENT

BAM as German competent authority for mechanical and thermal safety assessment, and for the approval of quality assurance measures in manufacturing, in the last three years concentrated not on spectacular approval tests of spent fuel full-scale casks, but on more sophisticated engineering design assessment aspects and on several test series of full –scale packages for fresh fuel. The fresh fuel package investigations are presented in other papers of this PATRAM conference. This paper summarizes the design assessment aspects concerning the mechanical analysis of trunnions and screws for trunnions and lid joints, neutron shielding material design criteria, and time and temperature influences on VITON gasket materials.