Dry cask storage
Dry cask storage is a method of storing high-level
There are various dry storage cask system designs. With some designs, the steel cylinders containing the fuel are placed vertically in a concrete vault; other designs orient the cylinders horizontally.[3] The concrete vaults provide the radiation shielding. Other cask designs orient the steel cylinder vertically on a concrete pad at a dry cask storage site and use both metal and concrete outer cylinders for radiation shielding. As of 2021 there is no long term permanent storage facility anywhere in the world; dry cask storage is designed as an interim safer solution than spent fuel pool storage.
Some of the cask designs can be used for both storage and transportation. Three companies – Holtec International, NAC International and Areva-Transnuclear NUHOMS – are marketing Independent Spent Fuel Storage Installations (ISFSI) based upon an unshielded multi-purpose canister which is transported and stored in on-site vertical or horizontal shielded storage modules constructed of steel and concrete.
Usage
During the 2000s, dry cask storage was used in the United States, Canada, Germany, Switzerland, Spain, Belgium, the United Kingdom, Japan, Armenia, Argentina, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Hungary, South Korea, Romania, Slovakia, Ukraine and Lithuania.[4][5][6]
A similar system is also being implemented in Russia. However, it is based on 'storage compartments' in a single structure, rather than individual casks.
In 2017 France's Areva launched the NUHOMS Matrix advanced used nuclear fuel storage overpack, a high-density system for storing multiple spent fuel rods in canisters.[7]
United States
In the late 1970s and early 1980s, the need for alternative storage in the United States began to grow when pools at many nuclear reactors began to fill up with stored spent fuel. As there was not a national nuclear storage facility in operation at the time, utilities began looking at options for storing spent fuel. Dry cask storage was determined to be a practical option for storage of spent fuel and preferable to leaving large concentrations of spent fuel in cooling tanks. The first dry storage installation in the US was licensed by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) in 1986 at the Surry Nuclear Power Plant in Virginia. Spent fuel is currently stored in dry cask systems at a growing number of power plant sites, and at an interim facility located at the Idaho National Laboratory near Idaho Falls, Idaho. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission estimates that many of the nuclear power plants in the United States will be out of room in their spent fuel pools by 2015, most likely requiring the use of temporary storage of some kind.[8] Yucca Mountain was expected to open in 2017. However, on March 5, 2009, Energy Secretary Steven Chu reiterated in a Senate hearing that the Yucca Mountain site was no longer considered an option for storing reactor waste.[9]
The 2008 NRC guideline calls for fuels to have spent at least five years in a storage pool before being moved to dry casks. The industry norm is about 10 years.[2][10] The NRC describes the dry casks used in the US as "designed to resist floods, tornadoes, projectiles, temperature extremes, and other unusual scenarios."[10]
As of the end of 2009, 13,856 metric tons of commercial spent fuel – or about 22 percent – were stored in dry casks.[2]
In the 1990s, the NRC had to “take repeated actions to address defective welds on dry casks that led to cracks and quality assurance problems; helium had leaked into some casks, increasing temperatures and causing accelerated fuel corrosion”.[11]
With the zeroing of the budget for
According to the NRC's website in 2023, spent fuel placed in dry cask storage from the Diablo Canyon power plant in Califorinia shows no sign of corrosion after more than a decade of storage and appears to be capable of lasting for 1800 years before succumbing to corrosion. [13] Company videos, covering the processes and remote handling, from the initial fuel loading to the removal and eventual dry-cask storage, are viewable on various video hosting domains.[14][15]
Canada
In Canada, above-ground dry storage has been used.
Germany
A centralized storage facility using dry casks is located at
CASTOR (cask for storage and transport of radioactive material) is a trademarked brand of dry casks used to store
CONSTOR is a cask used for transport and long-term storage of spent fuel and high-level waste also manufactured by GNS. Its inner and outer layers are steel, enclosing a layer of concrete. A 9-meter drop test of the V/TC model was conducted in 2004; the results conformed to expectations.[19]
Bulgaria
In 2008, officials at the Kozloduy Nuclear Power Plant announced their intention to use 34 CONSTOR casks at the Kozloduy NPP site before the end of 2010.[20]
Lithuania
Spent fuel from the now-closed Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant was placed in CASTOR and CONSTOR storage casks during the 2000s.[6]
Russia
The Russian dry storage facility for spent nuclear fuel, the HOT-2 at Mining Chemical Combine in Zheleznogorsk, Krasnoyarsk Krai in Siberia, is not a 'cask' facility per se, as it is designed to accommodate the spent nuclear fuel (both VVER and RBMK) in a series of compartments. The structure of the facility is made up of monolithic reinforced concrete walls and top and bottom slabs, with the actual storage compartments formed by reinforced concrete partitions. The fuel is to be cooled by natural convection of air. The design capacity of the facility is 37,785 tonnes of uranium. It is now under construction and commissioning.[21]
Ukraine
In Ukraine, a dry storage facility has been accepting spent fuel from the six-unit
Another project is underway with
See also
- Deep geological repository
- Ducrete
- Lists of nuclear disasters and radioactive incidents
- Nuclear decommissioning
- Nuclear flask
- Private Fuel Storage, proposed storage in Utah
References
- ^ "Dry Cask Storage". Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Retrieved 2011-03-17.
Dry cask storage allows spent fuel that has already been cooled in the spent fuel pool for at least one year to be surrounded by inert gas inside a container called a cask,
- ^ a b c "Spent Fuel Storage in Pools and Dry Casks: Key Points and Questions & Answers". Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Retrieved 2013-11-27.
Fuel is typically cooled at least 5 years in the pool before transfer to cask. NRC has authorized transfer as early as 3 years; the industry norm is about 10 years.
- ^ [1] NRC; Dry Cask Storage Figure 43
- ^ Agency, IAEA - Int. Atomic Energy. "Nuclear Fuel Cycle Facilities (NFCIS)". infcis.iaea.org. Retrieved 18 April 2018.
- ISBN 978-92-64-03255-2. Retrieved 22 March 2011.
- ^ Hanser, cited through CAT.INIST. 2006. Archived from the originalon 2012-08-17. Retrieved 2010-01-01.
- ^ "Areva's space-saving solution for used fuel storage". World Nuclear News. 29 September 2017. Retrieved 29 September 2017.
- ^ "NRC Graph of Spent Fuel Capacity". nrc.gov. Retrieved 18 April 2018.
- ^ Hebert, H. Josef. 2009. “Nuclear waste won't be going to Nevada's Yucca Mountain, Obama official says Archived 2011-03-24 at the Wayback Machine.” Chicago Tribune. March 6, 2009, 4. Accessed 2009-03-06.
- ^ a b "Fact Sheet on Dry Cask Storage of Spent Nuclear Fuel". NRC. May 7, 2009. Retrieved 2011-03-21.
- ^ Benjamin K. Sovacool (2011). Contesting the Future of Nuclear Power: A Critical Global Assessment of Atomic Energy, World Scientific, p. 144.
- ^ Matthew Wald (August 9, 2011). "Researching Safer Nuclear Energy". New York Times.
- ^ https://www.nrc.gov/waste/spent-fuel-storage/faqs.html#gen7
- ^ Dry Fuel Storage (Yankee Rowe)
- ^ Spent Fuel Storage at Diablo Canyon Power Plant
- ^ "Archived copy" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2007-10-13. Retrieved 2008-04-12.
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link) Ontario Power Generation ; Darlington Waste Management Facility - ^ "How Is It Stored Today?". Retrieved 2020-05-12.
- ^ ISBN 978-0-309-09647-8. Retrieved 2011-03-21.
- ^
"Drop Test Results of the Full Scale CONSTOR V/TC Prototype" (PDF). Bundesanstalt für Materialforschung und -prüfung. Archived from the original(PDF) on 2012-03-26. Retrieved 2010-01-10.
- ^ "The English Language Bulletin of Kozloduy Nuclear Power Plant" (PDF). Kozloduy Nuclear Power Plant Official Bulletin. 2008. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2013-05-24. Retrieved 2010-10-09.
- ^ "На ГХК успешно завершен второй этап пусконаладки оборудования на ХОТ-2". Archived from the original on 2014-03-02. Retrieved 2013-03-30.
- ^ "404 Page Not Found". Duke Energy. Archived from the original on 13 May 2013. Retrieved 18 April 2018.
{{cite web}}
: Cite uses generic title (help) - ^ "Holtec International Launches the Chernobyl Dry Storage Project". businesswire.com. Retrieved 18 April 2018.
- ^ "Energoatom tests Holtec used fuel casks at Rovno plant". World Nuclear News. 12 August 2019. Retrieved 13 August 2019.