Characterization of the Davis Canyon site, San Juan County, Utah, as a potential repository for the disposal of high level nuclear waste and spent fuel : McCleary, J Proc Symposium on Geology and Hydrology of Hazardous-Waste, Mining-Waste, Waste-Water and Repositories Sites in Utah, Salt Lake City, 1989P209–222. Publ Salt Lake City: Symposium and Field Conference, 1989 (Utah Geological Association Publication

Abstract

Abstract The Paradox Basin; an elongate, northwest-trending, asymmetrical, late Paleozoic pull-apart depositional basin approximately 12,000 square miles in area and underlain by salt deposits of the Paradox Formation, was studied from the early 1970’s through the mid-1980’s for the purpose of locating a nuclear waste repository. Studies were regional at first, becoming progressively more site specific with time. Three salt geometries; diapiric anticlines, non-diapiric anticlines, and bedded salt deposits were evaluated. The bedded configuration was selected for detailed study due largely to the anticipated regulatory environment and the need to accurately predict the long-term future behavior of the salt and surrounding rock and fluids when perturbed by excavation and the introduction of heat and radioactivity. Of the bedded areas examined, Davis Canyon was chosen based on criteria such as depth to and thickness of the proposed repository horizon, ground-water flow rates and directions, the potential for economic resources, the geomechanical and geochemical properties of the salt, and proximity to faults or dissolution fronts.