Improving the Regulation and Management of Low-Activity Radioactive Wastes Interim Report on Current Regulations, Inventories, and Practices (2003) / Chapter Skim
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3 Low-Activity Waste Overview
3 Low-Activity Waste Overview
Pages 25-38
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From page 25... ...
and commercial nuclear facilities have received the most attention from regulators and the public.2 LLW in the form of debris, rubble, and contaminated soils from facility decommissioning and site cleanup constitute much larger volumes than LLW from operational facilities but generally contain very low concentrations of radioactive material. Discrete radioactive sources that are no longer useful also meet the definition of LLW even though they may contain highly concentrated radioactive material.
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From page 26... ...
COMMERCIAL LOW-LEVEL WASTE Commercial LLW comes from nuclear power facilities and other industrial, medical, and research applications. Typical examples include protective shoe coverings and clothing, mops, rags, equipment and tools, laboratory apparatus, process equipment, reactor water treatment residues, non-fuel-bearing hardware, and some decontamination and decommissioning wastes.
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From page 28... ...
DOE LLW shipped to commercial facilities is subject to the USNRC's or the Agreement State's commercial waste regulations. SLIGHTLY RADIOACTIVE SOLID MATERIALS Nuclear facility decommissioning produces debris, rubble, and contaminated soil characterizes!
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From page 29... ...
FIN 1 , /81 1 ~ - ~ - ~ f far co c ~ o a cI ~ D_ cn cO o it' · t~ u) v v, 5 o to ~8 cot cot ~ O 0~6 .~0 ~ v: Interim Report 29
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From page 30... ...
~ cooperation with the Conference of Radiation Control Program Directors (CRCPD) , the EPA, USNRC, and DOE are funding a program to assist states to retrieve and securely dispose of orphan sources.5 While many discrete sources clearly are not low-activi~ materials, they meet the Nuclear Waste Policy Act definition of LLW (see Chapter 24.
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From page 31... ...
The USNRC has `determined that it does not have authority to regulate uranium mining and processing wastes at facilities that were not under USNRC license at the time of passage of UMTRCA. Some of these wastes, generated between the start of the Manhattan Project and 1978 and related to the nation's early atomic weapons program, are managed under the Formerly Used Sites Remediation Action Program (FUSRAP)
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From page 32... ...
Title I of UMTRCA deals with DOE remedial action programs at former mill tailings sites, and Title II deals with non-DOE mill tailings sites and uranium mining sites that are licensed by the USNRC or an Agreement State according to USNRC regulations (see Table 2.1 in Chapter 2 for details on UMTRCA)
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From page 33... ...
Atlantic Coastal Plain Oil and natural Scale and sludge Background to 2.6 States where petro gas production over 100,000 leum or natural gas is produced or processed Phosphate min- Oretailings and 7-55 48 Florida, Idaho, and ing and fertilizer phosphogypsum other states in the production*
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From page 34... ...
Except for Department of Transportation regulations on transportation of radioactive materials, for the most part NORM is not regulated by federal agencies but rather by states.7 As noted in Chapter 2, there is considerable variation among states, which often regulate non-AEA materials collectively as "NARM" (see Siclebar 3.2~. In Agreement States the same state agencies that have authority for AEA materials usually regulate NORM materials as well.
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From page 35... ...
For these "mixed wastes," regulations of the DOE, USNRC, or Agreement States control the radioactive constituents, and EPA regulations or state permits control the chemical constituents. Chemical hazards an(l their regulation are described in other reports (NCRP, 2002; NBC, 1999a,b, 2002c)
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From page 36... ...
A fourth facility at Grand View, Idaho, operated by U.S. Ecology and designed for chemically hazardous wastes, is currently receiving FUSRAP waste.
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From page 37... ...
put into place in the 1980s for managing commercial low-level radioactive waste have led to higher prices to generators. Potential lack of access to existing disposal capacity due to restrictions by host states creates concerns among generators, especially in view of the planned closing of the Barnwell site to users outside the Atlantic Compact in 2008.
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From page 38... ...
There are five designs for building disposal facilities: shallow land burial, modular concrete canister, below-ground vault, above-ground vault, and earth-mounded concrete bunker. Waste Treatment.
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