Review of the Department of Energy's Plans for Disposal of Surplus Plutonium in the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (2020) / Chapter Skim
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3 Plans to Dilute and Dispose
3 Plans to Dilute and Dispose
Pages 42-69
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1 The committee received a set of documents and several briefings from DOE-NNSA that describe its plans to dilute and dispose of 34 metric tons (MT) of surplus plutonium material.
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Plans to Dilute and Dispose TABLE 3-1 Set of DOE-NNSA Planning Documents for the Dilute and Dispose Program That Were Available to the Committee and Referenced Throughout This Chapter NOTES: All documents listed are available for public access. Savannah River Nuclear Solutions is a contractor that reports to DOE.
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However, the amount of diluted surplus plutonium material that is under consideration for dilution and disposal in WIPP is as large as 48.2 MT (see Figure 2-1)
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SOURCE: Modified from the DOE Master Schedule, available by request through the National Academies' Public Access Records Office at paro@nas.edu. Image provided by the Department of Energy.
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in South Carolina, where the oxidized plutonium material is diluted with a classified adulterant, packaged, characterized, and if determined to meet the WIPP waste acceptance criteria, it becomes approved for inclusion in payloads and awaits shipment to WIPP via TRU Waste Transport; and (E) the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP)
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Additional details are available in the documents listed in Table 3-1. 3.2.1.1 Pantex Operations DOE-NNSA's dilute and dispose activities at Pantex are related to the 26.2 MT of surplus plutonium pits, which are currently stored there.
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NDA is important for two reasons: the data are used, first, to determine that the diluted surplus plutonium material meets the WIPP waste acceptance criteria (WAC) , and second, for the tracking and accounting of the surplus plutonium material since the material is still under material safeguards.
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confirm that from 2012 to 2017, SRS shipped to and emplaced in WIPP at total of 666, 12-inch POCs stated to contain 61 kg of diluted surplus plutonium oxide.
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1) .a Within DOE-NNSA's dilute and dispose plan, there is a requirement that the diluted surplus plutonium TRU (DSP-TRU)
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Requirement P39: Dilute and Process shall demonstrate that the diluted plutonium conforms to Safeguards Criteria for a maximum attractiveness level "D." FIGURE 3-4 A schematic showing the different surplus plutonium containers that are used in the process of dilution. The 3013 and SAVY containers store plutonium oxide from LANL.
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The diluted surplus plutonium oxide is bagged inside of an outer can. Two outer cans of diluted surplus plutonium oxide, each containing nominally 150 fissile gram equivalents (FGE)
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FIGURE 3-7 Graph of the dilution rates and cumulative production of diluted surplus plutonium as a function of time. 12 This implies that not all of the CCOs were filled to the current maximum of 300 FGEs of plutonium-239.
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Once designated for the emplacement queue, waste is disposed underground typically the same day that the shipping container is unsealed. If WIPP emplacement operations are significantly delayed, then shipment of the surplus plutonium TRU waste will be paused at the Savannah River Site.
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We present below background information about OST and TRU waste transport as well as information pertaining to DOE-NNSA's dilute and dispose plans. 3.3.1 DOE Office of Secure Transportation As part of its mission to maintain national security and public safety, OST is responsible for the protection and transportation of special nuclear materials within the United States.
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The TRU waste transportation corridor identified in the dilute and dispose plans involves the following states: Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, New Mexico (the WIPP host state) , 18 OST provides information about its program to state and local law enforcement in three ways: • one of the OST liaisons will conduct an in-person community-level presentation where the liaison describes the program, shows a comprehensive video, then holds a question and answer period; • OST has a computer-based training program; and • an OST module with video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?
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Over 32 years, a robust transportation system for TRU waste has been designed, implemented, maintained, and updated. As evidence of the success of this approach, the Blue Ribbon Commission on America's Nuclear Future cited the TRU waste transportation model as a proven transportation system and recommended that DOE utilize it as a prototype for other nuclear materials and waste transportation campaigns including spent nuclear fuel and high level waste (BRC, 2012, p.
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3.3.2.1 Legal and Regulatory Requirements DOE's special nuclear materials transportation (i.e., OST) and its TRU waste transportation programs operate under guidance established in law, regulation, statute, rule, and internal DOE orders including development of DOE-NNSA equivalency orders.
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BOX FIGURE 2 (a) TRU Waste Transportation vehicle loaded with three TRUPACT-IIs, (b)
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and TRU Waste Transportation Program report that there have been 20 incident/accidents involving empty and loaded TRU transporters, none of which resulted in the release of radioactive or hazardous material since shipments to WIPP began in 1999. Of the 20 incidents/accidents, 6 occurred along the route from SRS to WIPP between 2005 and 2013.
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surplus plutonium disposition. Implementation of this electronic seal on TRUPACT-IIs used for transportation of the dilute and dispose TRU waste will enable NNSA to independently verify receipt of surplus plutonium materials at WIPP, if required.
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The NA-80 technical review also involved consideration of safeguards termination and extensive reviews of the longterm Campaign Plan, which outlines the technical requirements and planned operations for disposition of the surplus plutonium over a multidecade period. The committee further understands that any potential security risks identified by the MRRC process will be forwarded to the DOE Deputy Secretary together with mitigation strategies that seek to provide equivalencies to risk acceptance consistent with relevant procedures and policies for SNM.
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Further, the absence of these costs may result in inappropriate conclusions if the estimate is used to compare the LCCE for the Dilute and Dispose approach and the LCCE resulting from continuation of the MOX approach for disposition of surplus plutonium. This is because the values of these cost elements will not necessarily be the same for the MOX approach.
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For example, a recent draft supplemental analysis of the Site-wide EIS for Continued Operations of LANL reported TRU waste generation estimates for pit production to 28 See "DOE written responses to NAS Question Set Two," available by request through the National Academies' Public Access Records Office at paro@nas.edu. 29 At the time of the Interim Report's release, estimated volumes of TRU waste generated by pit production activities were not available.
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30 TABLE 3-2 Volumes of Emplaced and Future TRU Wastes for WIPP NOTES: References for the table values are included. ATWIR = Annual TRU Waste Inventory Report; DSP-TRU = diluted surplus plutonium transuranic; EIS = environmental impact statement; GTCC = Greater Than Class C; LWA = Land Withdrawal Act; VoR = volume of record; WDS/WWIS = Waste Data System/WIPP Waste Information System.
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The committee's assessment is summarized in Table 3-2. At the beginning of the committee deliberations, under the outer container volume accounting, it was evident that the total surplus plutonium inventory would exceed the WIPP capacity, as was noted in the DOE-NNSA Surplus Plutonium Disposition Performance Assessment Inventory Report -- 2017: "The volume of anticipated (stored plus projected)
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and DOE's National Nuclear Security Administration's (DOE-NNSA's) dilute and dispose plans, the DOE-NNSA Administrator, in consultation with the DOE-EM Assistant Secretary, should prioritize and reserve Land Withdrawal Act capacity in WIPP for the full amount of diluted surplus plutonium TRU waste (2,057 cubic meters)
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The dilute and dispose ROAR seeks to identify, quantify, and evaluate economic consequences of the dilute and dispose program. This application is similar to most economic risk and opportunity approaches with some interesting differences because it is a government-funded project and a large investment with numerous options.
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within the dilute and dispose program are identified and managed in addition to the numerous DOE nuclear safety and security orders to which all programs must comply. Therefore, DOE-NNSA should clearly state how the risks to human health and safety are addressed in its plans.
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