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Transporation container cut-away
Transportation Container Testing Films
Containers used to transport used nuclear fuel survive test crashes with trucks and trains at U.S. DOE Sandia National Laboratories.
Tests simulating Nuclear Regulatory Commission licensing requirements for container design.
Container dropped 30 feet onto a flat, unyielding surface, submerged under three feet of water for eight hours, dropped 40 inches onto a steel rod six inches in diameter, and engulfed in a 1,475 degree fire for 30 minutes.
26 second QuickTime Movie
(444k)
Show Movie
Tests staging real-world accidents.
Container loaded onto a locomotive and crashed at 80 miles per hour into a 700-ton concrete wall backed with 1,700 tons of dirt.
Container on a flatbed tractor-trailer broadsided by a 120-ton locomotive traveling at 80 miles per hour.
29 second QuickTime Movie
(520k)
Show Movie
Container loaded onto a truck and crashed at 80 miles per hour into a 700-ton concrete wall backed with 1,700 tons of dirt.
29 second QuickTime Movie
(492k)
Show Movie |
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Overview of High-Level Waste Transportation
Overview of U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE's) proposed spent nuclear fuel and High Level Waste (HLW) transportation systems: DOE has developed a private sector approach for moving spent nuclear fuel to a national geological repository (Yucca Mountain) in southern Nevada. DOE is pursuing an acquisition process that relies on private industry (contractors) to help the department provide services and equipment required to move waste to Yucca Mountain, Nevada. Under a draft Request for Proposals (RFP), published on September 1998 by DOE's Office of Civilian Radioactive Waste Management (i.e., OCRWM or RW), the department intends to purchase services and equipment from Regional Servicing Contractors (RSCs) who will perform waste acceptance and transportation operations to Yucca Mountain, Nevada.
OCRWM will maintain primary responsibility to the States, Tribes and Affected Units of Government (AUG) for assuring appropriate interaction and consideration of their input on transportation of spent nuclear fuel and will retain final approval of all transportation routes. The private sector contractors will accept spent nuclear fuel from its owners and generators (i.e., public and private nuclear power plants) and supply transportation casks and equipment for moving spent fuel to Yucca Mountain. |
Transportation Resources Information |
Lander County Rail Impact Assessment, January 2004
In the Final Environmental Impact Statement (FEIS), the DOE selected rail as the preferred transportation mode. Because there is no existing rail access to Yucca Mountain, DOE would have to construct a rail spur from an existing Union Pacific mainline track to the repository site. The study of branch rail lines through Nevada included five potential routes to Yucca Mountain: Caliente, Carlin, Caliente-Chalk Mountain, Valley Modified, and Jean. Of these five alternatives, the Carlin route would traverse Lander County. As a result of the direct impacts Lander County may incur from the project, the county has been designated an Affected Unit of Local Government (AULG) under the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982. As an AULG, Lander County has been provided federal funding to pursue additional studies of the local impact of the Yucca Mountain project. Through this program, Parsons Brinckerhoff Quade and Douglas (PB) was retained by Lander County to analyze the potential impacts that may arise from the construction and operation of the Carlin rail line through Lander County. (Very large file (10,879 kb)
Due
to the large size of this document it has been broken up
into sections as follows:
Pages
1– 11 (Adobe
PDF File 582 kb)
Pages
12-23 (Adobe
PDF file 544 kb)
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24-36 (Adobe
PDF File 409 kb)
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37-49 (Adobe
PDF File 2,412 kb)
Pages
50-63 (Adobe
PDF File 3,501 kb)
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| State of Nevada |
Counties
affected by high-level nuclear waste transportation |
Updated - Wednesday, February 28, 2007
State of Nevada - Presentation
to the Nevada Commission on Nuclear Projects: Review of
Proposed Mina/Schurz Rail Route – Impacts on Northern
Nevada Communities - Robert Halstead (pdf-4.25M)
Waste Management 2007 - Yucca
Mountain Transportation Security Issues - Presentation
at the Waste Management Conference, Tuscon, AZ (2/26/07) -
James David Ballard, Ph.D., Robert J. Halstead, Fred Dilger,
Ph.D. and Henry Collins, PE, CHP (pdf-3.13M)
Updated - Wednesday, January 31, 2007
ESRA Consulting Corporation - After
September 11th: Risk Assessment of Native American Pueblos
and Tribes of New Mexico on the Impacts of the Waste Isolation
Pilot Plant and its Transuranic Nuclear Waste Transportation
Routes - Presentation to the Transportation Research Board
of The National Academy of Sciences, TRB 86th Annual Meeting,
Washington, D.C.,23 January 2007 - Sandy H. Straus
(pdf-2.90M)
Updated - Tuesday, January 03, 2006
State of Nevada - State
of Nevada Comments on NRC's Draft Report on Spent Fuel Transportation
Package Response to the Baltimore Tunnel Fire Scenario (NUREG/CR-6886,
PNNL-15313) (pdf-65K)Updated - Wednesday, November 09,
2005
Nuclear Engineering International Magazine - Railroading
Nevada - Fred Dilger and Robert Halstead (pdf-391K)
Updated - Wednesday, November 02, 2005
State of Nevada - State
of Nevada Perspective on the Proposed Caliente Rail Corridor
- Presentation to the WIEB HLW Committee - Oct 13, 2005 -
Robert Halstead (pdf-5.93M)
Updated - Tuesday, October 25, 2005
State of Nevada - Update:
Counties Potentially Affected by the Rail Shipment of High
Level Waste and Spent Nuclear Fuel to Yucca Mountain (pdf-1.87M)
State of Nevada - Update:
Counties Affected by Truck Shipments of High-Level Radioactive
Waste to Yucca Mountain (pdf-132K)
State of Nevada - Update:
Potential Rail, Barge and Truck Routes to Yucca Mountain (pdf-3.04M)
DOE - Letter
to Hon. J. Bennett Johnston, Chairman, Energy and Natural
Resources Committee, Re: A New Strategy for Management
of Commercial Spent Nuclear Fuel (pdf-200K)
DOE - New
Yucca Mountain Repository Design to be Simpler, Safer and
More Cost Effective (pdf-37K)
DOE - Yucca
Mountain – Program Redirection Fact Sheet (pdf-58K)
Updated - Monday, September 26, 2005
State of Nevada - State
of Nevada Comments on the Department of Energy's Draft Environmental
Assessment for the Withdrawal of Public Lands for the Proposed
Caliente Rail Corridor(pdf-127K)
Updated - Wednesday, September 14, 2005
State of Nevada - State
of Nevada Preliminary Comments On DOE's Draft Environmental
Assessment for the Caliente Rail Corridor Land Withdrawal (pdf-54K)
Updated - Tuesday, July 19, 2005
DOE - Department
of Energy Policy Statement for Use of Dedicated Trains for
Waste Shipments to Yucca Mountain (pdf-27K)
Updated - Tuesday, June 21, 2005
State of Nevada - The
State of Nevada Reply Brief in the Legal Case Challenging
DOE's Yucca Mountain Transportation Mode and Rail Corridor
Decision (pdf-1,97M)
Updated - Wednesday, June 15, 2005
WGA - Policy
Resolution 05-15 - Transportation of Spent Nuclear Fuel and
High-Level Radioactive Waste (July 14, 2005) (pdf-27K)
Updated - Friday, May 20, 2005
State of Nevada - Hot
Time in The City: Which Shipment Mode for High Level Nuclear
Waste Affects Urban Areas Most -- Conference Paper - Waste
Management 2005 - Fred Dilger and Robert Halstead (pdf-1.89M)
State of Nevada - Integrating
Hazards Assessment and Impact Assessment: The Case of The
Caliente Rail Corridor to Yucca Mountain -- Conference
Paper - Waste Management 2005 - Fred Dilger and Robert
Halstead (pdf-791K)
State of Nevada - Measures
of Community Impact for The Transportation of Hazardous
Materials: The Case of Indian Tribes and High-Level Nuclear
Waste -- Conference Paper - Waste Management 2005 -
Fred Dilger, Robert Halstead, James David Ballard (pdf-1.24M)
State of Nevada - Planning
for an Unpredictable Event: Vulnerability and Consequence
Reassessment of Attacks on Spent Fuel Shipments -- Conference
Paper - Waste Management 2005 - Robert Halstead, James
David Ballard, Fred Dilger (pdf-336K)
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Risky Transit -- The Federal Government’s Risky and Unnecessary Plan to Ship Spent Nuclear Fuel and Highly Radioactive Waste on The Nation’s Highways and Rail Roads (pdf-971KB) -- State of Nevada, July 12, 2001 |
Testimony of Robert Halstead Before the Nevada State Senate Transportation Committee on Senate Joint Resolution No. 4 -- State of Nevada, March 22, 2001 |
Link to DOE's Waste Acceptance & Transportation website |
See State-by-State National HLW Transportation Routes
Will Nuclear Waste Travel Through Your State? -- This is an external link to the State of Nevada, Nuclear Waste Project Office. Maps of all states where nuclear waste would be transported to Yucca Mountain are shown. |
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The Safe Transportation of Used Nuclear Fuel
Small amount of waste carefully managed. The high-level waste currently produced by all U.S. nuclear power plants as used fuel rods totals about 2000 tons per year. The United States produces a total of about 41 million tons of hazardous waste each year, 8 million tons of which is routinely transported around the country annually. All used nuclear fuel has been managed so that no adverse impacts to human health or the environment has occurred.
Record of safety. The nuclear energy industry has carried out more than 3000 shipments of used nuclear fuel over 1.7 million miles of U.S. highways and railroads since 1964. No nuclear fuel container has ever leaked or cracked in any way. In total, fuel containers were involved in just eight accidents, only four with fuel loaded in the container. The most serious was an overturned truck in 1971. No radiation was released in any of the accidents.
Fuel container certification. A nuclear fuel container consists of literally tons of shielding inside a thick steel cylinder. Any container design must be licensed by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission before the container is used for shipment. The NRC will not certify the container until it undergoes a series of rigorous tests demonstrating that it is invulnerable to impact, flames, submersion and puncture.
Approved transportation routes. Used nuclear fuel may be shipped only along specified highway routes. Shippers submit routes to the NRC for approval ahead of time. The NRC checks that a route conforms to U.S. Department of Transportation regulations, requiring the most direct interstate route, and avoiding large cities when a bypass or beltway is available. NRC officials drive the route ahead of time if it has not been previously approved before or used within the past few years. They will check for law enforcement and emergency response capability as well as secure facilities for emergency stops. DOT regulations also require that the shipper notify the governor of each state on the route seven days before the trip.
Specialized shippers, certified drivers. Specialized trucking companies handle used nuclear fuel shipments in the United States. These experienced, specially licensed companies haul all kinds of hazardous materials more than 50 million miles annually. Vehicles are state of the art, equipped with computers that provide an instantaneous update on the truck's location and convey messages between driver and dispatcher through a satellite communications network. Drivers receive extensive training and must be certified.
Emergency response. The DOT and NRC establish emergency preparedness requirements for radioactive materials. The Federal Emergency Management Agency and the DOE provide emergency response training for state and local law enforcement officials, fire fighters, and rescue squads, covering preparedness planning and accident handling. In addition, DOE radiological assistance teams provide expertise and equipment, including mobile laboratories, to every region of the country. Also, according to a voluntary mutual assistance agreement, utilities respond to incidents in their area until emergency personnel from the shipper and shipping utility arrive. |
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