Safety and Security of Commercial Spent Nuclear Fuel Storage: Public Report (2006)
Chapter: CHARGE 3: POTENTIAL SAFETY AND SECURITY ADVANTAGES, IF ANY, OF DIFFERENT DRY CASK STORAGE DESIGNS
events in spent fuel pools that could result in propagating zirconium cladding fires. The committee judges that there are at least two such measures that should be implemented promptly:
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Reconfiguring of fuel in the pools so that high decay-heat fuel assemblies are surrounded by low decay-heat assemblies. This will more evenly distribute decay-heat loads, thus enhancing radiative heat transfer in the event of a loss of pool coolant.
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Provision for water-spray systems that would be able to cool the fuel even if the pool or overlying building were severely damaged.
Reconfiguring of fuel in the pool would be a prudent measure that could probably be implemented at all plants at little cost, time, or exposure of workers to radiation. The second measure would probably be more expensive to implement and may not be needed at all plants, particularly plants in which spent fuel pools are located below grade or are protected from external line-of-sight attacks by exterior walls and other structures.
The committee anticipates that the costs and benefits of options for implementing the second measure would be examined to help decide what requirements would be imposed. Further, the committee does not presume to anticipate the best design of such a system—whether it should be installed on the walls of a pool or deployed from a location where it is unlikely to be compromised by the same attack—but simply notes the demanding requirements such a system must meet.
CHARGE 3: POTENTIAL SAFETY AND SECURITY ADVANTAGES, IF ANY, OF DIFFERENT DRY CASK STORAGE DESIGNS
The third charge to the committee focuses exclusively on the safety and security of dry casks. The committee addressed this charge first in Chapter 4 to provide the basis for the comparative analysis between dry casks and pools as called for in Charge 2.
FINDING 4A: Although there are differences in the robustness of different dry cask designs (e.g., bare-fuel versus canister-based), the differences are not large when measured by the absolute magnitudes of radionuclide releases in the event of a breach. All storage cask designs are vulnerable to some types of terrorist attacks, but the quantity of radioactive material releases predicted from such attacks is relatively small. These releases are not easily dispersed in the environment.
FINDING 4B: Additional steps can be taken to make dry casks less vulnerable to potential terrorist attacks. Although the vulnerabilities of current cask designs are already small, additional, relatively simple steps can be taken to reduce them as discussed in Chapter 4.
RECOMMENDATION: The Nuclear Regulatory Commission should consider using the results of the vulnerability analyses for possible upgrades of requirements in 10 CFR 72 for dry casks, specifically to improve their resistance to terrorist attacks. The committee was told by
