Chapter 22 - Radioactive Waste Disposal

Abstract

This chapter discusses safe disposal of radioactive waste in order to provide safety to workers and the public. Radioactive wastes arise from a great variety of sources, including the nuclear fuel cycle, and from beneficial uses of isotopes and radiation by institutions. Spent fuel contains uranium, plutonium, and highly radioactive fission products. In the United States spent fuel is accumulating, awaiting the development of a high-level waste repository. A multi-barrier system involving packaging and geological media will provide protection of the public over the centuries the waste must be isolated. The favored method of disposal is in a mined cavity deep underground. In other countries, reprocessing the fuel assemblies permits recycling of materials and disposal of smaller volumes of solidified waste. Transportation of wastes is by casks and containers designed to withstand severe accidents. Low-level wastes (LLWs) come from research and medical procedures and from a variety of activation and fission sources at a reactor site. They generally can be given near-surface burial. Isotopes of special interest are cobalt-60 and cesium-137. Transuranic wastes are being disposed of in the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant. Establishment of regional disposal sites by interstate compacts has generally been unsuccessful in the United States. Decontamination of defense sites will be long and costly. Decommissioning of reactors in the future will contribute a great deal of low-level radioactive waste.