Management of Legacy Spent Nuclear Fuel Wastes at CRL: The challenges and Innovative Solutions Implemented

Abstract

AECL has operated research reactors at the Chalk River Laboratories (CRL) site since 1947, for the purpose of nuclear energy and scientific research and for the production of radioisotopes. During the 1950s and 60s, a variety of spent nuclear fuel wastes were produced by irradiating metallic uranium and other prototype fuels. These legacy waste fuels were initially stored in water-filled fuel storage bays for a period of several years before being placed in storage containers and transferred to the CRL Waste Management Areas (WMAs), where they have been stored in below-grade, vertical cylindrical steel and concrete structures called “tile holes.”AECL’s Fuel Packaging & Storage (FPS) Project was initiated in 2004 to retrieve, transfer, and stabilize an identified inventory of degraded research reactor fuel that had been emplaced within in-ground “tile hole” structures in Chalk River Laboratories’ Waste Management Area in the 1950s and 60s. Ongoing monitoring of the legacy fuel storage conditions had identified that moisture present in the storage structures had contributed to corrosion of both the fuel and the storage containers. This prompted the initiation of the FPS Project which has as its objective to design, construct and commission equipment and systems that would allow for the ongoing safe storage of this fuel until a final long-term management, or disposition, pathway was available