spent fuel. The cycle begins with the mining and milling of uranium ore. Centralized mills extract uranium from the ore and convert it to uranium oxide (U ̧O), which is then shipped to specialized plants for conversion to uranium hexafluoride (UF). After enrichment of the 235U component from 0.7 percent to about 3 percent, the UF, is shipped to commercial fabrication. plants where it is converted to uranium dioxide (UO) powder. It is then pressed into pellets, stacked into fuel rods, and combined into fuel assemblies for use in reactors.22

Nuclear power reactors produce electrical power from the energy released during fission of the uranium fuel." There are two isotopes of uranium in reactor fuel: 97 percent is 238U; 3 percent is 235U. Inside reactors the uranium in fuel rods is bombarded by neutrons. Upon absorbing a neutron, 235U undergoes fission into two atoms of lighter weight elements called fission products. This reaction releases about two thirds of the heat generated by the reactor. Concurrently, 238U absorbs neutrons, but instead of undergoing immediate fission, it is transmuted into plutonium-239, which is called a transuranic element, because it has a higher atomic number than does uranium. When plutonium absorbs a neutron, it undergoes fission, and this process generates about one-third of the heat released in a fission reactor. Once the reactions are started, they continue in a chain reaction, because one neutron causing fission in a 235U atom releases two neutrons, and plutonium-239 releases three neutrons when it is bombarded. The processes continue at specified rates in reactors, because extra neutrons beyond those needed for proper operations are absorbed by non-reactive elements in "control rods" that can be inserted into or retracted from the reactor. When the reactor has operated long enough to reduce the percentage of 235U to a concentration that will not sustain efficient fission reactions, the fuel is "spent." Spent fuel contains radioactive wastes in the form of residual uranium, plutonium, and unstable fission products. If spent fuel is reprocessed to retrieve the residual uranium and plutonium for further use in reactors a so-called "nuclear fuel cycle" is established. If those elements are not reclaimed, the nuclear fuel system proceeds from mining, to refinement, to use in a reactor, to disposal of spent fuel, without using a nuclear fuel "cycle."24 Figure 1-2 illustrates the fractional amounts of nuclear waste generated in the fuel cycle.

Thus, two options are available for spent fuel disposition. One is to handle the fuel as HLW and to dispose of it as such. Currently, spent fuel remains at nuclear power plants within holding pools. Another option is to reprocess spent fuel, extracting uranium and plutonium for use in reactors. The latter alternative calls for chopping the used fuel assemblies, treating them with nitric acid to leach spent fuel out of the cladding,

and then chemically extracting residual uranium and the plutonium created in the fission process. The resultant liquid normally contains hundreds of thousands of curies of radioactivity per gallon. Technology exists to calcine (boil dry and bake into sand-like granules) or vitrify (evaporate and fuse into dense glass) the waste for ultimate disposition.25

Waste from the use of uranium for nuclear fuel varies in level and quantity, from large amounts of tailings produced in milling uranium ore to processed waste from UF, conversion and fuel fabrication, to fission products and plutonium, to routine reactor wastes, such as ion exchange resins, cartridge filters and combustible solids. At the end of a reactor's life, the decommissioning wastes, such as irradiated reactor internals and reactor components, will also require treatment or disposal.26

Domestic civilian nuclear power reactors vary in size from 50 to 1,250 megawatts of power produced for electricity. The average reactor size is about 1,000 megawatts, capable of supplying the electricity needs of about half a million people.27

Non-fuel cycle waste results from various applications, such as nuclear and medical research. Radioactive waste is generated by institutions not only as sophisticated by-products of research using neutron activation analysis, particle accelerators, and research reactors but also as bulk trash consisting of paper, towels, rubber or plastic gloves, broken labware, and disposable syringes. 28

U.S. Inventory

The majority of our country's processed HLW has resulted from defense-related DOE activities and is stored at three Federal sites: Savannah River Plant, South Carolina; Idaho Chemical Processing Plant, Idaho; and Hanford Reservation, Washington." Only a small amount of commercial reprocessed HLW, generated in the commercial operation of the Nuclear Fuels Services Plant at West Valley, New York, from 1966 to 1972, exists outside of these major locations.30 This waste is currently in liquid form, and there are plans to vitrify it for final disposal." Although most of the commercial spent fuel is stored at the nuclear power reactor sites of privately and publicly owned electric power companies, minor amounts are stored at two nonfunctioning civilian reprocessing plants at West Valley, New York, and Morris, Illinois. 32

To comply with current U.S. policy, defense wastes are being converted for storage from their initial liquid form to intermediate solids, such as salt cakes, sludge, or calcine." Final disposal forms have not been selected, except at Savannah River where plans are underway to vitrify wastes." The Savannah River Plant and the Idaho Chemical Processing Plant also store spent test reactor and research fuel." Besides military

Inc.

waste, DOE manages radioactive waste from its uranium enrichment and breeder reactor operations and from its space and naval programs."

DOE stores military transuranic waste at the Idaho National Engineering Laboratory in surface storage facilities. The Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP), located in a deep salt layer near Carlsbad, New Mexico, is being constructed to provide a research and development facility to demonstrate the safe disposal of TRU waste from national defense programs. Authorized by Public Law 96-164, the DOE National Security and Military Application Nuclear Energy Authorization Act of 1980, WIPP is exempted from NRC licensing. The primary objectives of WIPP are "to demonstrate through a full-scale pilot plant the technical and operational methods for permanent isolation of defensegenerated radioactive waste and to provide a facility for experiments on the behavior of high-level waste in bedded salt." The plant is designed to receive, inspect, emplace, and store defense waste.37

Table 1-1 lists the 1982 inventory of U.S. spent fuel and reprocessed HLW from commercial and military sources. At the end of 1982, the United States was storing nearly 32,000 fuel rod assemblies that con

tained inore than 8,700 metric tons of uranium and more than 11 billion curies of radioactivity. In addition, Federal Government sites contained over 310,000 cubic meters or about 1.4 billion curies of HLW. Most of this HLW resulted from military applications. Nearly 2.9 million cubic meters of LLW containing about 16,500 curies of radioactivity were disposed of at national LLW sites.

Table 1-2 divides the inventory of HLW into its component parts and storage site. The HLW stored at the Nuclear Fuel Services Plant in West Valley, New York, resulted from reprocessing spent fuel from commercial plants and one reactor at Hanford, and from the reprocessing of a small amount of thorium-uranium fuel from another source. Reprocessing at the Nuclear Fuel Services Plant and Hanford Reservation was terminated in 1972, and no additional HLW has since been generated at these sites. Reprocessing of HLW does continue at the Savannah River and Idaho sites,38 and it was restarted at Hanford in November 1983.

Figures 1-3 and I-4 place this inventory into perspective by graphically showing that most of the 3.58 million cubic meters of radioactive waste is low-level, while spent fuel accounts for more than 88 percent of

the 12.5 billion curies of radioactivity in the U.S. radioactive waste inventory. Figure 1-5 projects cumulative volumes for this inventory through 2020; Figure I-6 projects the radioactivity accumulated from 1980 to 2020. These projections are based on DOE estimates of future nuclear power growth as of January 1983. Figure I-5 illustrates the dramatic increase in the volume of LLW when projected to 2020. Dealing with this

amount of waste will challenge individual States, which, as Chapter III of this report explains, are responsible for disposing of LLW generated within their borders. The volume of spent fuel rods stored at commercial reactor plants can barely be perceived when compared with the bulk of projected LLW. Figure 1-6, however, shows that the radioactivity in spent fuel is much greater than in TRU or LLW. The predicted growth of

2 Calculated values allowing for radioactive decay.

Figure I-5.-Projection of Cumulative Volumes for Various Wastes and Spent Fuel.

Source: U.S. Department of Energy. 1983. Spent Fuel and Radioactive Waste Inventories, Projections, and Characteristics. DOE/NE-0017/2, Assistant Secretary for Nuclear Energy and Assistant Secretary for Defense Programs, Washington, D.C., p. 10.

spent fuel radioactivity dominates all forms of U.S. radioactive waste regardless of whether the rods remain in their current configuration or are transformed into another form of HLW.

International Inventory

The commitment to nuclear power in many other nations equals or exceeds that of the United States. Nuclear power accounts for more than 25 percent of the electricity generated in the Soviet Union, France, United Kingdom, Japan, Federal Republic of Germany, and Canada. Moreover, in addition to the United States, 23 nations have nuclear reactors generating electricity, and an additional 17 have firm commitments for nuclear power programs.40 At the beginning of 1983, there were 297 nuclear reactors generating more than 173 gigawatts of electricity in nations around the world."11

France's 32 operating reactors produce more than 40 percent of its electrical power output, and France intends to generate 85 percent of its electricity from nuclear reactors by the end of the century. Advancements in nuclear power are not limited to western nations-in 1982, the Peoples Republic of China ordered its first commercial reactor; Brazil installed a commercial reactor; India and Japan commenced construction of

1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010 2015 2020

YEAR

EXCLUDES MILL TAILINGS, COMMERCIAL
DECONTAMINATION AND DECOMMISSIONING
WASTES AND DOE REMEDIAL ACTION WASTES.
TOTAL CURIES FROM THESE SOURCES ARE LESS
THAN TRU WASTE AND LLW.
DOE-Department of Energy

Figure 1-6.-Projection of Cumulative Radioactivity for Various Wastes and Spent Fuel.

Source: U.S. Department of Energy. 1983. Spent Fuel and Radioactive Waste Inventories, Projections, and Characteristics. DOE/NE-0017/2, Assistant Secretary for Nuclear Energy and Assistant Secretary for Defense Programs, Washington, D.C., p. 10. reprocessing plants; and the Republic of Korea began a program for fast breeder reactors.42

Cumulative spent fuel that will be generated by the year 2000 from the global use of nuclear power is estimated by one source to be about 300,000 metric tons of heavy metal. Spent fuel reprocessing capacity will probably increase to 7,000 metric tons per year by 2000. If all the spent fuel were to be reprocessed, some 10,000 cubic meters of conditioned high-level waste and nearly one million cubic meters of conditioned low-level waste would require disposal by 2000.43

There are several major international organizations involved in the problems of managing nuclear waste. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) was formed in 1960 to promote global economic growth. The members of the OECD are: Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, the Federal Republic of Germany, Greece, Iceland, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, the United Kingdom, and the United States." The OECD Nuclear Energy Agency (NEA), formed in April 1972, is designed to "promote cooperation between its member governments on the safety and regulatory aspects of nuclear development, and on assessing the future role of nuclear energy as a contributor to economic progress," and works in close collaboration with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).45