Although they are nearly at the final depth, the work thus far has been primarily to construct the 4-km long access tunnel. The facility is not scheduled to accept the nuclear waste until 2020 but once it does, it will have enough space for about 7 reactor’s worth of spent fuel for 100-years of their operation. That would put final sealing of the facility in 2120. One interesting thing that caught my attention is that according to Posiva, the agency responsible for facility, after 500 years the radiation dose standing next to one of the canisters would be equivalent to a CAT Scan. [Source: hs.fi via Ontario-geofish]
Miscellaneous
It’s Official – USDOE ‘Pulls the Plug’ on Yucca Mountain
It’s been evident for a while that Yucca Mountain was history after it was announced that it’s funding was eliminated by President Obama. ENR is reporting that the USDOE is officially withdrawing its Nuclear Regulatory […]
Available Resources
Yucca Mountain – $32 Billion More
Thanks to Harold at the Ontario-geofish blog, I came accross this AP article that releases the first Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository cost estimate update since 2001. The US DOE now puts the cost of the facility at $90 billion, up $32 billion from that 2001 estimate. Of course that estimate is slightly deceptive. It covers the $9 billion already spent and 100 years of operation. Perhaps the bigger issue is funding has not been secured largely in part to the efforts of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (Democrat-NV). If a steady stream of money can be secured, the best case scenario for the facility is a 2020 opening.
I also found a neat blog called Yucca Facts that has a refreshing perspective on the facility that is pro-science if not necessarily pro-Yucca. They also have a commentary about this latest DOE announcement and some commentary on Senator Reid.
Geophysics
Hanford nuclear waste retrieval resumes with better technology (GPR)
Ground penetrating radar (GPR) imaging of the subsurface tied to GPS mapping will allow the CH2M Hill Plateau Remediation Company to have a better idea of what is buried at the site before excavating for […]