Perplexed By Design

Abstract

Decades of legislation and court interpretations have left U.S. nuclear waste managers facing an intractable problem. Tasked with understanding science and skilled enough to work within constraints set by policy-makers, these managers sort various types of radioactive waste so they can be disposed of in accordance with the law. It’s a complicated job. Now, waste management companies are urging the Nuclear Regulatory Commission ( NRC) to take another look at the limitations of the current U.S. classification system and to possibly simplify it. This, in turn, raises questions about how the existing scheme works and how it compares with the international system. “Waste classification is a really messy business to write about,” says Allen Croff, almost as soon as he answers a phone call from C&EN. Croff, now retired from Oak Ridge National Laboratory, led the National Council on Radiation Protection & Measurements (NCRP) in an effort to revamp the ...