High‐level radioactive waste management in the USA

Abstract

High‐level radioactive waste (HLW) disposal policy in the USA since 1987 has focused on a site in volcanic tuffs 305 meters beneath Yucca Mountain, Nevada, with current plans calling for the repository to be opened in 2017 subject to approval by the Obama Administration. Yet the offsite radiation release standards of the US Environmental Protection Agency are still being finalized, and there is significant doubt over whether a repository at Yucca Mountain can be successfully licensed by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Moreover, the proposed repository has a capacity cap insufficient to accept the total HLW stream from the civilian and military sectors, and focus on a single site is unnecessarily risky. Thus, the HLW problem in the USA remains far from being solved. After providing an overview of the nuclear waste regime of the USA, this paper reviews the technical, legal, and political status of the Yucca Mountain project. A large range of current issues and social values are discussed in this context, including the recently proposed Global Nuclear Energy Partnership that would revive spent fuel reprocessing and has important implications for national security and nuclear non‐proliferation.