Year
1987
Abstract
As directed by the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982 (NWPA), the Department of Energy (DOE) is developing a nationwide system for transporting spent nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive waste from commercial power plants to deep geologic repositories for disposal. Plans for the transportation system will consider the following factors: the President's 1985 decision to co-locate some defense high-level waste with commercial waste in a repository, the NWPA requirement that the private sector be used to the fullest extent possible in developing and operating the system, and the possible approval by Congress of the DOE's proposal for a Monitored Retrievable Storage (MRS) facility, submitted in March 1987. (The MRS, if approved, would provide for the consolidation, packaging, and perhaps the temporary storage of spent fuel from reactors.) The \"Transportation Business Plan\", published in January 1986, reflects these considerations. The transportation system, when operational, will consist of two elements: (1) the cask system, which includes the transportation casks, the vehicular conveyances, tie-downs, and associated equipment for handling the casks; and (2) the transportation support system which is comprised of facilities, equipment, and services to support waste transportation. Development of the transportation system incorporates the following work elements: operational planning, support systems development, cask system development, systems analysis, and institutional activities. This paper focusses on the technical aspects of the system; institutional elements are reviewed in Ms. Judith Holm's paper, \"Issue Resolution Processes in the Civilian Radioactive Waste Transportation Program,\" published elsewhere in this volume.