Affordable Cleanup? Opportunities for Cost Reduction in the Decontamination and Decommissioning of the Nation's Uranium Enrichment Facilities (1996) / Chapter Skim
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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Pages 1-14
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From page 1... ...
Risks to public health and safety from the currently nonoperating GDP at Oak Ridge are small and do not require urgent action; the situation will be the same for the other two GDPs once they cease operations. However, until the D&D is complete, preventing the release or spread of the hazardous and radioactive materials inside the GDP buildings requires significant expenditures for surveillance, maintenance, and monitoring, and the risks will increase with tune.
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From page 2... ...
The highly enriched uranium section of the Portsmouth plant has undergone such treatment to remove a significant part of the highly enriched uranium deposits representing a criticality concern. The USEC is obligated to remove uranium deposits representing a criticality risk before returning the facilities to DOE.
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From page 3... ...
Although the risk is low, it will increase with time if the buildings and process equipment are allowed to deteriorate; for example, water could leak into the buildings and carry contaminants into the surrounding environment or, at the Oak Ridge GDP, possibly initiate small nuclear criticality events. The current program to remove uranium deposits at the Oak Ridge site is directed toward eliminating such a possibility; namely, removing the deposits that have the potential for a criticality incident.
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From page 4... ...
An initial estimate by Ebasco amounted to about $46 billion, but a successive set of reevaluations resulted in a final D&D cost estimate of $16.1 billion. The decrease in estimated cost from $46 billion to $16.1 billion reflected changes in scope and assumptions including reductions in overhead rates, fewer newly constructed facilities, greatly reduced program integration costs, and reductions in waste management costs.
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For low-level radioactive wastes rapidly rising disposal costs, closure of disposal sites, and potential public opposition to transport and licensing of new disposal sites make such waste management, siting, and transport uncertain and increasingly expensive. There are regulatory uncertainties about mixed wastes and, to a lesser degree, also about hazardous wastes.
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From page 6... ...
Previous D&D Experience The committee reviewed the Ebasco and TEG cost estimates, other cost analyses of the D&D of the GDPs, and experience from the D&D of nuclear power reactors, such as the Shippingport Atomic Power Station. It also had the benefit of actual reported data from the D&D of the British Nuclear Fuels Ltd.
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From page 7... ...
Need for New Facilities The Ebasco and TEG cost estimates assume the construction of two, new generalized multi-purpose facilities: a high-assay decontamination facility for equipment contaminated with highly enriched uranium; and a low-assay decontamination facility-for equipment contaminated
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From page 8... ...
The cost estimates also assumed construction of a new administration building at the Oak Ridge GDP site for several thousand people, the large staff resulting from the assumed management and contracting approach. Such construction is not warranted, especially if the ~ contracting approaches are implemented, which should reduce the size of the management and professional staff to levels that can adequately be housed in existing administrative buildings.
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From page 9... ...
Guidelines for decommissioning have been published by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and by DOE. Cooperative efforts are under way by DOE, the Environmental Protection Agency, and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to develop release standards based on current radiation protection concepts.
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From page 10... ...
The D&D plan should incorporate all major assumptions (technical, cost, and institutional) , a proposed management organizational structure for both DOE and the decommissioning operations contractor, tradeoff studies for determining an optimized decommissioning sequence, a detailed work breakdown structure, and a detailed cost estimate and schedule.
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From page 11... ...
For example, regardless of the end states of the sites, removal of highly enriched uranium deposits from the Oak Ridge process equipment should be a first priority because this would reduce ~ .
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From page 12... ...
Support of current DOE robotics programs, with highly focused demonstrations to verify potential cost savings and safety benefits. The committee recommends that a modest research program be established to develop methods to effectively decontaminate the diffusion barrier material.
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From page 13... ...
Significant savings in the cost of long-term storage should be possible by improving the physical properties of the U3O8; in particular, increased particle size and much higher packing density should be possible, which would reduce storage costs based on volumetric fees. This area promises benefits from a limited research and development program.
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