By John Stang
Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board is examining geologic research conducted in Europe for nuclear waste repositories in part to get a head start on such studies if the Yucca Mountain project is permanently rejected.
The board, an independent advisory and review panel, keeps tabs on the nation’s radioactive waste repository and spent nuclear fuel programs.
In its fall meeting Wednesday and Thursday, the board met online to be briefed on underground research lab projects in argillite, crystalline and clay rock layers in several countries in Europe. In the United States, the long-stalled Yucca Mountain radioactive waste and spent fuel repository in Nevada in a geological formation known as volcano tuff. The Waste Isolation Pilot Project in New Mexico is a salt geologic environment.
Faced with strong bipartisan opposition from Nevada’s congressional delegation, Congress has not appropriated money to Yucca Mountain since 2010, stalling that project indefinitely.
The Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board (NWTRB) is in the preliminary stages of gathering information on how to study geological environments different from Yucca Mountain — which could be similar to any of the environments found at nuclear waste repositories in Canada and Europe, said Timothy Gunter, program manager for disposal research and development in the Department Energy’s Office of Nuclear Energy.
Repositories In Russia and Finland are in granite gneiss rock. In Canada and Sweden, the host rock is granite. In France, the repository is in argillite.
Looking at the European and Canadian research gives the United States a head start on geological studies if Yucca Mountain is finally and formally abandoned and Congress selects a different home for a permanent repository.
Also, since American experts in the geology of nuclear repositories are reaching retirement age, studying European projects will help younger scientists gain expertise in this subject, said participants in the Wednesday’s and Thursday’s sessions.
Right now, the NWTRB and the Department of Energy OE are working out the broad, generic concepts of how they should study argillite, crystalline and clay environments.
