Effects of actinide burning on waste disposal at Yucca Mountain

Abstract

Partitioning the actinides in spent fuel and transmuting them in actinide-burning liquid-metal reactors (ALMRs) is a potential method of reducing public risks from the geologic disposal of nuclear waste. In this paper, the authors present a comparison of radionuclide releases from burial at Yucca Mountain of spent fuel and of ALMR wastes. Two waste disposal schemes are considered. In each, the heat generation of the wastes at emplacement is 9.88 {times} 10{sup 7} W, the maximum for the repository. In the first scheme, the repository contains 86,700 tonnes of initial heavy metal (IHM) of light water reactor (LWR) spent fuel. In the second scheme, all current LWRs operate for a 40-yr lifetime, producing a total of 84,000 tonnes IHM of spent fuel. This spent fuel is treated using a pyrochemical process in which 98.4% of the uranium and 99.8% of the neptunium, plutonium, americium, and curium are extracted and fabricated into ALMR fuel, with the reprocessing wastes destined for the repository. The ALMR requires this fuel for its startup and first two reloads; thereafter, it is self-sufficient. Spent ALMR fuel is also pyrochemically reprocessed: 99.9% of the transuranics is recovered and recycled into ALMR fuel, and the wastes are placedmore » in the repository. Thus, in the second scheme, the repository contains the wastes from reprocessing all of the LWR spent fuel plus the maximum amount of ALMR reprocessing wastes allowed in the repository based on its heat generation limit.« less