DOE Procurement Activities for Spent Fuel Shipping Casks

This established to satisfy the requirements of the NWPA. The program is designed to provide safe efficient casks on a timely schedule. The casks will be certified by the NRC in compliance with the 1987 amendment to NWPA. Private industry will be used to the maximum extent. DOE will encourage use of present cask technology, but will not hesitate to advance the state-of-the-art to improve efficiency in transport operations, provided that safety is not compromised. DOE will support the contractor's efforts to advance the state-of-the-art by maintaining a technical development effort that will respond to the common needs of all the contractors. DOE and the cask contractors will develop comprehensive and well integrated programs of test and analysis for cask certification. Finally, the DOE will monitor the cask development program within a system that fosters early identification of improvement opportunities as well as potential'problems, and is sufficiently flexible to respond quickly yet rationally to assure a fully successful program. paper discusses the DOE cask development program