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DOE announces NEPA exclusion for advanced reactors
The Department of Energy has announced that it is establishing a categorical exclusion for the application of National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) procedures to the authorization, siting, construction, operation, reauthorization, and decommissioning of advanced nuclear reactors.
According to the DOE, this significant change, which goes into effect today, “is based on the experience of DOE and other federal agencies, current technologies, regulatory requirements, and accepted industry practice.”
J. A. Blink, G. P. Lasche
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 4 | Number 2 | September 1983 | Pages 1146-1151
Environment and Safety | doi.org/10.13182/FST83-A23013
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Five steels (PCA, HT-9, thermally stabilized 2.25 Cr-1 Mo, Nb stabilized 2.25 Cr-1 Mo, and 2.25 Cr-1 V) are compared as a function of time from the viewpoints of activation, afterheat, inhalation biological hazard potential (BHP), ingestion BHP, and feasibility of disposal by shallow land burial. An additional case uses the 2.25 Cr-1 V steel with a liquid metal wall (LMW) protective shield between the neutron source and the wall. (This geometry is feasible for inertial confinement fusion reactors.) The PCA steel is the worst choice and the LMW protected 2.25 Cr-1 V is the best choice by substantial margins from all five viewpoints. The HT-9 and two versions of 2.25 Cr-1 Mo are roughly the same at intermediate values. The 2.25 Cr-1 V has about the same afterheat as those three steels, but its waste disposal feasibility is considerably better. Under NRC's proposed low level waste disposal rule (10CFR61), only the 2.25 Cr-1 V could be considered low level waste suitable for shallow land burial.