Tracy Mustin
Program Manager, Foreign Research Reactor Program
Office of Spent Fuel Management
DOE EM-67

Robert Stump
Project Manager, Foreign Research Reactor Program
DOE-Idaho

Theodore Smith
Nuclear Engineer
SAIC

Up to one metric ton of TRIGA (Training, Research and Isotope-General Atomics) spent fuel containing uranium enriched in the United States will be transported from 19 countries to the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory (INEEL) interim storage under the Department of Energy's (DOE) Foreign Research Reactor (FRR) Spent Nuclear Fuel Acceptance Policy. Some of the TRIGA FRR spent fuel will be shipped from seven Asian countries through the Concord Naval Weapons Stations on San Francisco Bay for subsequent transhipment to INEEL. This first West Coast shipment is scheduled for mid-1998.

This paper will provide an overview of the significant preparation activities required to successfully implement this shipment. These activities have been coordinated by the DOE-HQ Office of Spent Fuel Management in close cooperation with DOE-Idaho and it contractor Lockheed Martin Idaho Technologies Company (LMITCO), the National Transportation Program, and numerous federal, state, tribal and local entities. The efforts of DOE have included coordination with Department of State, foreign government agencies, and the reactor operators to arrange for the scheduling and acceptance of the fuel. Additionally, DOE-Idaho has conducted significant transportation planning with State, local, and tribal organizations. The stakeholder focused planning has addressed both technical considerations associated with spent fuel transportation safety and security, and public perceptions associated with the program.

Almost two years ago, in May 1996, the United States adopted a 10-year policy to accept U.S. origin research reactor spent nuclear fuel into the United States from other nations. This policy supports U.S. nuclear weapons nonproliferation objectives and demonstrates the Department's commitment to the reduction and eventual elimination of the use of highly enriched uranium from civil commerce.

The origins of this policy go back 40 years; under President Eisenhower's "Atoms for Peace" program, the United States exported enriched uranium to allies for use as nuclear fuel in research reactors. Under this program, recipient countries agreed not to develop nuclear weapons if the United States would assist them with peaceful applications of nuclear energy. To ensure that this material was not used for weapons production, the United States accepted the resulting spent fuel until the policy expired. Based on an environmental impact statement, the Department of Energy in consultation with the Department of State, issued a Record of Decision on May 13, 1996 announcing its decision to accept and manage in the United States foreign research reactor spent fuel from 41 countries.

Implementation of this policy will involve acceptance of up to 19.2 MTHM (metric tons of heavy metal) of foreign research reactor spent nuclear fuel and approximately 0.6 MTHM of target material into the United States. The policy is effective for 10 years with a 3 year extension for fuel cool-down. Thus, spent fuel and target material must be removed from the reactor prior to May 12, 2006 to be eligible for shipment until May 12, 2009.

In the Department of Energy, spent fuel is generally managed at a site designated for that type of fuel. Consistent with the Department's policy for managing domestic spent nuclear fuel, aluminum-based Materials Test Reactor (MTR, also called "plate-type") spent fuel is managed at the Savannah River Site (SRS) while non-aluminum based Training, Research, and Isotope-General Atomics (TRIGA, also called "rod-type") spent fuel is managed at the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory (INEEL).

At this time, 5 shipments containing 31 casks of MTR spent nuclear fuel have been transported to the SRS. Four of the shipments went through the Charleston Naval Weapons Station and one cask shipment was received by truck from Canada. These shipments have safely moved 1,131 spent fuel elements and over 100 kg of weapons grade material from 11 countries around the world.

About one metric ton of TRIGA spent fuel will be transported from 19 countries to INEEL for management and interim storage. Some of the TRIGA FRR spent fuel located in research reactors in Asia and the pacific rim will be shipped through the Concord Naval Weapons Station (NWS) near San Francisco, for subsequent shipment to INEEL. Specifically, spent fuel located in South Korea, Indonesia, Thailand, Taiwan, Malaysia, Bangladesh, and the Philippines will be shipped to INEEL via the west coast port-of-entry . The first west coast shipment is scheduled for Mid-1998, and will consist of three casks of spent fuel from South Korea and one cask from Indonesia.

In the course of the significant planning and preparation for the Concord NWS shipment, the Department has addressed a number of state and local concerns regarding the shipment. Many aspects of the first west coast shipment differ from the program's five previous successful shipments over the last two years and so have been carefully evaluated. The Department has worked hard to ensure that the program has utilized our past accomplishments as guide for this next phase of the program. Personnel from the Savannah River Site (SRS) and INEEL have been participating in planning and preparation activities at each others sites in an attempt to take full advantage of lessons learned in the transportation processes.

The first west coast shipment will be unique to the program in several ways: It is the first shipment through the Concord NWS under the new policy, the first spent fuel to be transported to INEEL under the program, and the first FRR fuel to managed in a dry-storage facility.

A brief discussion of how the Department has prepared for this shipment, and how we have applied lessons learned from previous successes to the planning process, is discussed below. One thing that is not new to the program, however, is litigation. Unfortunately, the Department is currently undergoing a legal challenge from Contra Costa County, and the city of Concord, California, which prevents any discussion of potentially related aspects of the program. However, should the court rule in the Department's favor, the earliest a shipment could arrive would be June 1998.

For FRR shipments from other than high-income economy countries, DOE utilizes a transportation services contractor to complete the shipment. The transportation services contractor for this shipment, NAC International, is responsible to ensure that all technical and regulatory requirements are satisfied during the loading and transportation of the spent fuel. NAC International brings spent fuel handling expertise and FRR specific experience to the program. The NAC International Legal Weight Transport (LWT) cask and crew were utilized in the first shipment of FRR spent nuclear fuel under this policy from Chile and Colombia in September 1996. NAC International first operated as a full transportation service contractor under the Department of Energy contract during the January, 1998 shipment of spent fuel from Greece.

In both South Korea and Indonesia, the spent fuel is located in two geographically separate locations. Starting back in October 1996, officials from the DOE Headquarters, DOE-ID and contractor support began meeting with reactor operators in South Korea, Thailand, and Indonesia to encourage participation in the program, determine spent fuel availability for shipment, and assess the condition of spent fuel in storage. Subsequently, it was determined that the first shipment would likely consist of spent fuel from reactor and storage facilities in Indonesia and South Korea as described in the following table:

In follow up assessments at these facilities in May and June 1997, representatives from DOE-Headquarters, DOE-Idaho, and LMITCO carefully evaluated and documented the condition of each fuel element eligible for shipment. Every element which does not strictly meet an established set of criteria will be placed inside a can prior to cask loading and shipping to the INEEL. Initial estimates indicate that 33 fuel elements will likely need to be canned. The canning criteria are based on a November 1997 report issued by the National Spent Nuclear Fuel Program, and approved for use in this program in February 1998. Separate site visits were conducted in winter 1997 by representatives from DOE-Headquarters, Lockheed-Martin, and NAC International (and subcontractors) to assess the safeguards, security and operational and transportation aspects of the overseas portion of the shipment. Contract negotiations with the reactor operators and in Indonesia and South Korea are well underway, but not completed.

At each site, the spent fuel will be wet-loaded into a series of fuel baskets in the spent fuel storage pool. The fuel baskets are loaded and transferred one at a time into the shipping cask. Five baskets will be stacked in the NAC-LWT cask. The basket design and the cask design utilized for TRIGA fuel will be NRC approved, and DOE representatives will observe the spent fuel canning and loading operations at the overseas facilities. The shipment will be tracked by satellite transponder from the port of departure to the INEEL receiving site.

Subsequent to the DOE decision to ship TRIGA spent fuel via Concord NWS, and in response to stakeholder concerns, DOE-Idaho commissioned a detailed route study. The route alternative study evaluated 12 potential routes from the Concord NWS to INEEL based on four factors: 1) population, 2) track quality, 3) distance and 4) risk. Based on the results, DOE selected two routes as the preliminary preferred primary and alternate routes for the west coast shipment DOE is currently in the process of submitting route determination documentation to the NRC for the train shipment from Concord NWS to INEEL.

The domestic portion of the shipment, which will take approximately two days, and transits four states (California, Nevada, Utah and Idaho) and tribal lands (e.g., Pyramid Lake Indian Reservation and Fort Hall Indian Reservation), commences at a sea buoy eleven miles offshore from the California coast. Inspections and surveys by DOE, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, and state radiation health officials are completed before the shipment is unloaded directly onto waiting rail cars at the Concord Naval Weapons Station. After additional inspections by the DOE, Federal Railroad Administration, the State of California and the shipper, the rail shipment will to the INEEL will commence.

In preparation for the shipment, DOE-Headquarters, DOE-Idaho, and LMITCO representatives have been meeting with various State, Tribal, and local officials, local hazardous materials teams, transportation and emergency preparedness officials and security specialists to ensure that the necessary training and coordination has been completed and equipment is available in the unlikely event of an incident involving FRR spent nuclear fuel. DOE has met with Congressional staffs, State officials, county Boards of Supervisors, Mayors, officials in major population centers, and Tribal leaders along the potential routes to address issues and concerns regarding the shipment. DOE-Idaho office has conducted Table Top Needs Assessments with jurisdictions in all four states along the two possible transportation routes, and is providing training to address issues raised by stakeholders. The following training courses have been developed and provided by the DOE-Idaho and LMITCO as needs have been identified along the potential transportation routes:

• Radioactive Material Basics for Emergency Responders
• Transportation Risk Communications
• Radiological Risk Fundamentals
• Radiological Rail Response
• Public Information Officer Training

Additionally, DOE-Idaho and LMITCO have developed an educational trailer called "The RAD Experience."

DOE has also taken additional steps in response to concerns raised by state and local officials regarding the safety of this spent nuclear fuel shipment. In October 1997, Secretary Peña directed that the shipment be delayed until at least April 1998 to ensure that the rail shipment would not occur during periods of possible heavy snowfall in the Sierras.

At the request of California representatives Ellen Tauscher and George Miller, the Department has reviewed rail safety procedures with the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA), which is identifying additional safety measures above and beyond the existing FRA high level nuclear waste policy (which includes spent fuel) that will be utilized for this shipment. This "Safety Action Plan" may include measures such as:

• The FRA will inspect the track, including bridges and overpasses, along the route three to four months prior to the shipment. Any discrepancies will be corrected and reinspected.
• A same-day verification of operational conditions along the rail route.
• The rail cars and locomotives will be inspected by Union Pacific, FRA and State Public Utilities Commission officials prior to leaving Concord NWS to verify operational readiness.
• Grade crossings along the route will be inspected to confirm lights and gates are operational. Union Pacific, FRA and DOE will work with State and local officials to determine if additional safety measures are needed at historically high risk crossings.

When the spent fuel shipment arrives at the INEEL, it will be transferred into a dry storage facility for interim storage awaiting final disposal in a geologic repository. The cask handling and fuel movement procedures have been prepared and were successfully dry run at INEEL in fall 1997.

The efforts required to thoroughly prepare for the first West Coast shipment of FRR spent fuel have required and will continue to require substantial dedication and coordination from a number of organizations. A broad range of functional expertise has been and will be employed in support of these preparations to ensure that no precautions or activities are overlooked.

A number of challenges to the success of the west coast shipment remain: contracts with FRR operators in Indonesia and South Korea need to be completed; the final selection of the transportation route must be made; training and preparations, including implementation of FRA measures, must be finished, and finally, table top exercises with appropriate state, local and tribal organizations to validate readiness must be accomplished.

The successful first west coast shipment of FRR spent nuclear fuel later this year will mark the completion of a major milestone for the FRR program, and in a complex and sometimes difficult program, advance an important United States nuclear nonproliferation goal.

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