Nuclear Waste:  Yucca Mountain Poses Long-Term Challenges, Expert Says

By Mike Nartker
Global Security Newswire

DENVER — Long-term management of the planned U.S. high-level nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain will pose unique challenges for the Energy Department as it tries to find ways to communicate the facility’s dangers and purpose over the next 10,000 years, according to a paper presented Tuesday at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Last July, U.S. President George W. Bush formally designated the Nevada site as the first long-term U.S. storage facility for spent nuclear power plant fuel and other highly radioactive wastes (see GSN, July 23, 2002).

Yucca Mountain is charged with protecting humans and the environment from the effects of nuclear waste at least 10,000 years.  To meet this long-term requirement, knowledge of the repository itself and a capability in repository-related sciences and expertise will need to be maintained for a similar span of time, says the paper, prepared by Abraham Van Luik of the Energy’s Office of Repository Development.

Once the repository is filled and sealed, future generations will need detailed knowledge of the facility in case they choose to reopen it someday, possibly to recover plutonium from the spent fuel, the paper says.  They will also need to know how to prevent accidental intrusion.  Even if future generations choose not to access the repository, they will still need basic knowledge of what the repository is, the paper adds.

“What future societies do is not in our control,” the paper says.  “What those future societies know can be influenced by the information we leave for them,” it adds.

Although the repository is not scheduled to be sealed for hundreds of years, plans should be made now to prevent or discourage exploration, and possible intrusion, of the site, according to the paper.  This system should include both markers at the site explaining what is there and records of the repository stored by international governments, it says.

Currently, Energy’s Yucca Mountain program plans to use a system of markers based on those designed for the low-level nuclear Waste Isolation Pilot Project repository in New Mexico, the paper says.  That system includes numerous layers of information and warnings, the paper says.  For example, a set of nine-inch diameter markers made of granite, aluminum oxide and fired clay, to provide longevity, is set to be buried throughout the WIPP site, the paper says.  The markers will contain information and warnings in seven languages.  Granite markers will also be erected around the perimeter of the WIPP site, which will be inscribed with information and warnings in seven languages, the paper says.

The WIPP site will also include an information center consisting of a granite interior and exterior walls, which will be inscribed with information in both text and pictures.  The WIPP repository will contain two buried rooms with the same information, in the event the repository is visited generations later, the paper says.  While the existence of one of the two rooms will not be documented on-site, it will be included in information stored at other locations, according to the paper.  The site’s records are also set to be stored and maintained at several locations throughout the world, the paper adds.

Maintaining Scientific Knowledge

Besides establishing a system to inform future generations as to what the Yucca Mountain repository is and what it contains, future generations also need to maintain a capability in repository-related sciences and expertise to be able to maintain, or at the least continue to monitor, the site after it is sealed, according to the paper.  This knowledge will be necessary regardless of whether future generations live in a Mad Max-style, or even more primitive, world, or a world straight out of the technological utopia depicted in the Jetsons.

“Repositories are built to not require maintenance, and thus can cope if future society returns to the equivalent of the Stone Age.  Hunter-gatherer bands are not likely to intrude, nor are they likely to drill deep semi-permanent wells,” the paper says.  ‘The state of technology in the world over the last thousand of years, however, suggests that progress is the word to best describe the last millennium,” it adds.

One concern is that young people are losing interest in pursuing careers in nuclear science and engineering because of their difficulty and relatively low pay, according to the report.  In addition, the lack of science and math education in the lower grades in public schools have led to a lack of enrollment in science and math programs at the college level, which in turn, leads to a lack of qualified people for math and science careers, the report says.

Energy has established programs to support and increase graduate-level nuclear science and education programs, the report says.  It warns, however, that such programs are primarily effective for the new few generations.

“Beyond several generations … there can only be trust that future generations will have the same vision of the need to maintain science and engineering capabilities and will act to implement that vision,” the report says.

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Radiological Weapons:  Cesium Missing From Georgian Facility

Three containers of cesium-137 disappeared last December from a former Soviet military base in Georgia, near Tblisi, Civil Georgia reported today (see GSN, Oct. 23, 2002).

Cesium-137 could be used in a “dirty bomb,” which disperses radioactive material with a conventional explosion.

“We do not have any suspects yet, since the military patrol of the base was changing every day and we do not have neither the exact date of theft, nor the eyewitnesses,” said Mamuka Tsaava, chief military prosecutor of Georgia’s Kvemo Kartli region.

Georgian authorities said there were no facilities in the country that could process the material.

“The only explanation to the theft is that somebody will try to sell it abroad,” said Leri Meskhi, head of the Radioactive Security Division of the Environment Ministry.

Russian military forces were stationed at the base until 2001, when the facility was handed over to the Georgian military.  The cesium was supposed to be relocated to a special warehouse, but it was kept in place because there were no available sites to receive it, according to Meskhi (Tea Gularidze, Civil Georgia, Feb. 20).

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