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GAO: Clarification of HLW definition could save DOE billions
A clearer definition of what constitutes high-level radioactive waste could save the Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management “tens of billions of dollars” in waste management costs and accelerate its cleanup schedule by decades, according to a report by the U.S. Government Accountability Office.
DOE-EM’s efforts to manage waste resulting from legacy spent nuclear fuel reprocessing have been hindered for decades by the ambiguity of the statutory definition of HLW as laid out in the Atomic Energy Act and Nuclear Waste Policy Act, the report states. While admitting that the DOE has taken steps to overcome this ambiguity, the GAO says that the department has not fully evaluated all available opportunities to treat and dispose of waste more economically as either transuranic or low-level radioactive waste.
Sebastian Fischer, Kerstin Schönung, Beate Bornschein, Rolf Rolli, Vera Schäfer, Michael Sturm
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 67 | Number 2 | March 2015 | Pages 316-319
Proceedings of TRITIUM 2013 | doi.org/10.13182/FST14-T19
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Anti-reflection coated windows are part of Raman spectroscopy systems for tritium analytics in the KATRIN experiment and fusion-related applications. Damages of such windows were observed after three months of exposure to highly purified tritium gas in the LOOPINO facility. In this work, the origin of the damages was investigated, identified and eliminated. Coating samples manufactured by various physical vapor deposition methods have been tested for durability by exposure to pure tritium gas and subsequent visual inspection. Electron beam deposited coatings showed indications for damage after 17 days of tritium exposure in contrast to samples manufactured by ion assisted deposition or sputtering. An improved coating layout of the sample cell is presented for reliable long-term monitoring of tritium gas using Raman spectroscopy.
