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Nuclear Waste Reprocessing

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Reprocessing and Recycling Nuclear Waste, by Gus Merwin
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Reprocessing and Recycling Nuclear Waste Gus Merwin Psc 403 B
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Page 1: Nuclear Waste Reprocessing

Reprocessing and Recycling Nuclear Waste

Gus MerwinPsc 403 B

Page 2: Nuclear Waste Reprocessing

There is NO Nuclear “Waste”

In chemical reactions waste is a product that is in the lowest energy state so it offers no further use.

Page 3: Nuclear Waste Reprocessing

Used Nuclear Fuel Anatomy

The Nuclear Fuel Cycle Dr. Tsoulfanidis’

Page 4: Nuclear Waste Reprocessing

What is Reprocessing / Recycling

• Reprocessing is the process of removing useful material from used nuclear fuel.

• Recycling is the process of re-burning the “waste” in a reactor.

Page 5: Nuclear Waste Reprocessing

REPROCESSING/RECYCLING (R&R)

• Electro-refining facilities. ($5 billion??)• MOX fuel fabrication facility ($5 billion or

nothing if we utilize Savannah River, SC)• Vitrification plant ($2 billion??)• Fast neutron reactor

– $15 billion(??) for Pebble Bed with R&Dor

– $10 billion(??) for LMFBRPrices are extremely approximate ± $2-5 billion

Page 6: Nuclear Waste Reprocessing

Benefits of Reprocessing1. Get the waste out of here

The San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station is 60 miles from down town LA. If its spent fuel pools were attacked death tolls could be in the hundreds of thousands.

Page 7: Nuclear Waste Reprocessing

2. Don’t pay billions to put it hereBenefits of Reprocessing

By operating the Yucca Mountain repository the government would be paying billions of dollars, to store billions of dollars worth of energy.

http://www.world-nuclear-news.org/newsarticle.aspx?id=24418

Page 8: Nuclear Waste Reprocessing

8

3. Don’t build more repositoriesNuclear Futures Existing

License Completion

ExtendedLicense

Completion

Continuing Level Energy Generation

Continuing Market Share Generation

Growing Market Share Generation

Cumulative Used Fuel in 2100 (MTHM)

90,000 120,000 250,000 600,000 1,500,000

Existing Reactor Only Existing and New Reactors

Fuel Management Approach Number of Repositories Needed (at 70,000 MT each)Direct Disposal(current policy)

2 2 4 9 22

Direct Disposal withExpanded

Repository Capacity

1 1 2 5 13

Limited Thermal recycle

With Expanded Repository Capacity

1 1 1 3 7

Repeated Combined Thermal and Fast

Recycle

(Requires new reactors)

1 1 1

E. Gonzalez-Romero, Euradwaste’08, Luxembourg, 20-22 OCT 08

Benefits of Reprocessing

Page 9: Nuclear Waste Reprocessing

4. Burn it!Benefits of Reprocessing

There is more than 57,000 tons of spent nuclear fuel in the Untied States. 97% of that can be used to release enormous amounts of energy in the above, or similar, reactions.

http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/fact-sheets/fs-yucca-license-review.html

Page 10: Nuclear Waste Reprocessing

Benefits of Reprocessing5. Make the waste not last for 1,000,000 years

With transmutation, an offshoot of reprocessing, the radioactive half-life of the waste can be dropped to less than a few hundred years vs. one million.

J. Bouchard, IEA, Paris 2008

Page 11: Nuclear Waste Reprocessing

Drawbacks

• PUREX (Plutonium Uranium Extraction) isolates Plutonium. Carter ends reprocessing 1977

• In the United States Reprocessing is not cost effective… unless….

Proliferation

Cost

Page 12: Nuclear Waste Reprocessing

Flaws in the so called drawbacks“The misuse of civilian nuclear facilities for the production of weapons, although possible, is neither the easiest nor the most efficient way to achieve such an objective.”

-International Nuclear Fuel Cycle Evaluation (INFCE) 1980

Thirty years containment … Failure

India, Pakistan, North Korea,…South Africa, Israel, Iran?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/shared/spl/hi/world/03/nuclear_powers/html/uk.stm, CIEP

Page 13: Nuclear Waste Reprocessing

• There are also pilot plants in China, Pakistan, and Germany.• China has stated publicly that they will reprocess on an industrial scale by

2025• Every one of these plants operates on the PUREX process which was

invented in the United States in 1947.

Reprocessing across the globe

Raymond G. Wymer, Vanderbilt University, https://smr.inl.gov/Document.ashx?

Private conversation with reprocessing specialist at INL

Page 14: Nuclear Waste Reprocessing

• Yucca Mountain has already cost $10 billion. $30 billion for completion • The Nuclear Waste Fund ($.001/kWh surcharge on nuclear power) has

accumulated $35.7 billion.

• The cost of catastrophe due to a natural disaster, or terrorist attacks on nuclear fuel storage is a cost that should never have to be calculated.

• We should not be sacrificing national security for economics.

Flaws in the so called drawbacksCost

With these costs factored in, several full scale fuel reprocessing plants could easily be constructed.

NIE “Nuclear Waste Fund Payment Information by State” / DOEhttp://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/fact-sheets/fs-yucca-license-review.html

Page 15: Nuclear Waste Reprocessing

Pyroprocessing

QuickTime™ and aTIFF (Uncompressed) decompressor

are needed to see this picture.

http://www.anl.gov/Media_Center/Frontiers/2002/d1ee4.html

Page 16: Nuclear Waste Reprocessing

Pyroprocessing

• Does not isolate Plutonium• Less costly• Higher efficiency than

PUREX, theoretically >99%

• Uses no water

• PUREX proven technology• So far only proven on

engineering scale• Can not be scaled up, many

smaller batches must be employed

• Most suitable for metal fuel• Issues with safeguards

Pros Cons

Page 17: Nuclear Waste Reprocessing

Recommended next steps

• More funding for R&D of cost effective, proliferation resistant processes for the next 10 years

• Begin construction of reprocessing facility in 10 years

– Pyroprocesing facility

– MOX fabrication facility (Savannah River SC)

– Pebble Bed Fast Neutron Reactor

Page 18: Nuclear Waste Reprocessing

PBR

• Passive safety features• 15% greater efficiency than water cooled reactor• Requires less water than a standard reactor• Burns actinides (the 3% that last for thousands of years)

Page 19: Nuclear Waste Reprocessing

Summary• R&R is cost effective

• R&R is safer than long term storage

• R&R Extends fuel supplies ~10,000 years

• R&R Reduces volume of waste

• R&R Reduces lifetime of waste

• R&R Reduces the overall cost

Page 20: Nuclear Waste Reprocessing

POLICY RECOMENDATION

Reprocess, Recycle and store nuclear waste in Nevada.

Benefits for Nevadans -Massive construction employment 15 years -Continuous operational employment -Surge in technical industries and academic funding for

Nevada universities

Page 21: Nuclear Waste Reprocessing

As history progresses Uranium prices will go up. Unless we start working towards reprocessing now, our experienced scientists will die out. We will be forced to pay for French or Chinese facilities, or have to store waste for several millennia.

Any Questions?


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