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Glass strategy: Hanford’s enhanced waste glass program
The mission of the Department of Energy’s Office of River Protection (ORP) is to complete the safe cleanup of waste resulting from decades of nuclear weapons development. One of the most technologically challenging responsibilities is the safe disposition of approximately 56 million gallons of radioactive waste historically stored in 177 tanks at the Hanford Site in Washington state.
ORP has a clear incentive to reduce the overall mission duration and cost. One pathway is to develop and deploy innovative technical solutions that can advance baseline flow sheets toward higher efficiency operations while reducing identified risks without compromising safety. Vitrification is the baseline process that will convert both high-level and low-level radioactive waste at Hanford into a stable glass waste form for long-term storage and disposal.
Although vitrification is a mature technology, there are key areas where technology can further reduce operational risks, advance baseline processes to maximize waste throughput, and provide the underpinning to enhance operational flexibility; all steps in reducing mission duration and cost.
W. A. Houlberg, S. E. Attenberger
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 26 | Number 3 | November 1994 | Pages 566-571
Plasma Heating and Current Drive, Plasma Engineering | Proceedings of the Eleventh Topical Meeting on the Technology of Fusion Energy New Orleans, Louisiana June 19-23, 1994 | doi.org/10.13182/FST94-A40217
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The reactor potential of some advanced physics operating modes proposed for the TPX physics program [1] are examined. A moderate aspect ratio (A = 4.5 as in TPX), 2 GW reactor (see Table I for parameters) is analyzed because of its potential for steady-state, non-inductive operation with high bootstrap current fraction. Particle, energy and toroidal current equations are evolved to steady-state conditions using the 1-1/2-D time-dependent WHIST transport code [2]. The solutions are therefore consistent with particle, energy and current sources and assumed transport models. Fast wave current drive (FWCD) provides the axial seed current. The bootstrap current typically provides 80–90% of the current, while feedback on the lower hybrid current drive (LHCD) power maintains the total current. The sensitivity of the plasma power amplification factor, Q ≡ Pfus/Paux, to variations in the plasma properties is examined. The auxiliary current drive power, Paux = PLH + PFW; bootstrap current fraction; current drive efficiency; and other parameters are evaluated. The plasma is thermodynamically stable for the energy confinement model assumed (a multiple of ITER89P). The FWCD and LHCD sources provide attractive control possibilities, not only for the current profile, but also for the total fusion power since the gain on the incremental auxiliary power is typically 10–30 in these calculations when overall Q ≈ 30.