Assessment of compliance with ground water protection standards in the 2008 performance assessment for the proposed high-level radioactive waste repository at Yucca Mountain, Nevada

•Extensive work has been carried out by the U.S. DOE in the development of a proposed geologic repository at Yucca Mountain (YM), Nevada, for the disposal of high-level radioactive waste.•Determination in the 2008 YM performance assessment of compliance with U.S. NRC ground water protection standards is described.•Regulatory background and the analysis structure including characterization of uncertainty are described.•Analysis results for ground water protection standards are presented.•Uncertainty and sensitivity analysis results based on Latin hypercube sampling and partial rank correlation coefficients are presented.

Extensive work has been carried out by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) in the development of a proposed geologic repository at Yucca Mountain (YM), Nevada, for the disposal of high-level radioactive waste. In support of this development and an associated license application to the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), the DOE completed an extensive performance assessment (PA) for the proposed YM repository in 2008. This presentation describes the assessment of compliance with ground water protection standards in the 2008 YM PA. The following topics are addressed: (i) regulatory background, (ii) analysis structure including characterization of uncertainty, and (iii) analysis results for each of the ground water protection standards. The present article is part of a special issue of Reliability Engineering and System Safety devoted to the 2008 YM PA; additional articles in the issue describe other aspects of the 2008 YM PA.