Analysis on the characteristics of geologic disposal waste arising from various partitioning and conditioning options

Siting a nuclear geological repository entails high economic, social, and political costs. The concept of expanding the capacity of repository is of great interest to the nuclear industry. Partitioning and conditioning (P&C) technology of high level radioactive liquid waste (HLLW) is expected to be effective to mitigate the burden of repository by removal of some elements from disposal waste and reducing the repository size necessitated to emplace the waste forms. The impacts of P&C technology on the characteristics of disposal waste are discussed in this paper. Four P&C options are assumed in the analysis: (1) Spent fuel once through, to dispose spent fuel directly; (2) Conventional reprocessing, to dispose vitrified HLLW glass; (3) Reprocessing plus long-lived nuclides partitioning, to dispose waste streams without minor actinides (MAs), rare earth elements (REs), Tc and Pu; (4) Reprocessing plus high thermal output nuclides separation, to dispose waste streams without Sr&Cs. The partitioning scheme is based on China's TRPO full partitioning process and its experimental results. The waste conditioning and disposal is in accordance with the specifications of Yucca Mountain Repository. The content of disposal waste stream in each option is presented and its characteristics, such as mass, volume, linear loading capacity, thermal power and linear thermal power, are identified.