Skip to main content

Safety and Security of Commercial Spent Nuclear Fuel Storage Public Report (2006) / Chapter Skim
Currently Skimming:


Pages 57-59

The Chapter Skim interface presents what we've algorithmically identified as the most significant single chunk of text within every page in the chapter.
Select key terms on the right to highlight them within pages of the chapter.


From page 57...
... FINDING 3B: The committee finds that, under some conditions, a terrorist attack that partially or completely drained a spent fuel pool could lead to a propagating zirconium cladding fire and the release of large quantities of radioactive materials to the environment Details are provided in the committee's classified report. It is not possible to predict the precise magnitude of such releases because the computer models have not been validated for this application.
Read the entire page →
From page 58...
... In addition, there are plant-specific differences among BWRs and PWRs that could increase or decrease the vulnerabilities of the pools to various kinds of terrorist attacks, making generic conclusions difficult. FINDING 3E: The Nuclear Regulatory Commission and independent analysts have made progress in understanding some vulnerabilities of spent fuel pools to certain terrorist attacks and the consequences of such attacks for releases of radioactivity to the environment.
Read the entire page →
From page 59...
... RECOMMENDATION: While the work described in the previous recommendation under Finding 3E, above, is being carried out, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission should ensure that power plant operators take prompt and effective measures to reduce the consequences of loss-of-pool-coolant events in spent fuel pools that could result in propagating zirconium cladding fires. The committee judges that there are at least two such measures that should be implemented promptly: • Reconfiguring of fuel in the pools so that high decay-heat fuel assemblies are surrounded by low decay heat assemblies.
Read the entire page →

Key Terms

  • spent fuel
  • zirconium cladding
  • fuel storage
  • fuel pool
  • terrorist attacks

  • nuclear regulatory
  • dry cask
  • cladding fire
  • regulatory commission
  • pwr spent

  • fuel pools
  • pool storage
  • terrorist attack
  • fuel assemblies
  • bwr spent

  • thermal behavior
  • power plant
  • dry casks
  • commercial nuclear
  • radioactive material

  • cladding fires
  • decay heat
  • reactor core
  • classified report
  • discharged spent

  • heat transfer
  • reactor sites
  • plant operators
  • propagating zirconium
  • committee judges


    • This material may be derived from roughly machine-read images, and so is provided only to facilitate research.
    More information on Chapter Skim is available.