Fleet of Type B packaging for low level radioactive waste shipments

The United States have already announced around 20 reactor shutdown and many more in the next 10 year. Financial constraints on plant operators and the low cost of fossil energy contribute to accelerate the shutdown of additional reactors. To improve the cost efficiency of the upcoming projects, larger and more capacitive transport casks are needed to transport increasing volume of Low Level Waste (LLW) at a more attractive cost. Waste disposal is also a major cost element in a dismantling project. Consequently, the capacity to segment, package and transport the waste in the most optimized configuration will result in significant cost savings. The key element to succeed is the availability on the market of a licensed type B transport packaging with a larger payload that allows at the same time an optimization of the waste segmentation operations.Orano TN has developed and licensed a fleet of diverse casks to support the increase in waste packaging and transportation. This fleet includes the MP197HB designed and licensed as versatile high capacity type B casks for the transport of spent fuel canisters as part of the NUHOMS® system that can also be used to transport radioactive waste. While it will take a few more years to transport spent fuel to a consolidated interim storage facility and even more to a repository, the MP197HB can be used to transport activated LLW from dismantled reactors to disposal sites.A first of a kind project will be performed with Orano’s partner NorthStar at Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Plant. Orano’s team will perform the reactor segmentation and package the material into an Orano’s large capacity type B cask. This unmatched packaging capacity is expected to significantly decrease the LLW disposal costs, while optimizing the on-site operations costs and the schedule.This paper will present the main characteristics of the packaging, provide an update of the overall project schedule, and explain Orano’s innovations that contribute to simpler and more cost effective transport and operations solutions.