This “Technical Evaluation Report on the Content of the U.S. Department of Energy’s Yucca Mountain License Application; Postclosure Volume: Repository Safety After Permanent Closure” (TER Postclosure Volume) presents information on the NRC staff’s review of DOE’s Safety Analysis Report (SAR), provided on June 3, 2008, as updated by DOE on February 19, 2009. The NRC staff also reviewed information DOE provided in response to NRC staff’s requests for additional information and other information that DOE provided related to the SAR.

The U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Office of Civilian Radioactive Waste Management (OCRWM) is responsible, under the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982, for the transportation of spent nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive waste from point of origin to destination at a federal storage or disposal facility. Section 180(c), written into the Nuclear Waste Policy Act Amendments of 1987, requires OCRWM to prepare public safety officials along the routes for these shipments.

The objective of this safety requirements publication is to set down the protection objectives and criteria for geological disposal and to establish the requirements that must be met to ensure the safety of this disposal option, consistent with the established principles of safety for radioactive waste management.

EPRI has discovered several aspects of the U.S Department of Energy (DOE) proposed design and operation of the Yucca Mountain repository that—if implemented as described in the license application (LA)—could result in unnecessary occupational health and safety risk to workers involved with repository-related activities. This report identifies key DOE conservatisms and focuses on the occupational risk consequences of the DOE's approach to the repository design, performance assessment, and operation.

This new report from the National Research Council’s Nuclear and Radiation Studies Board (NRSB) and the Transportation Research Board reviews the risks and technical and societal concerns for the transport of spent nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive waste in the United States. Shipments are expected to increase as the U.S. Department of Energy opens a repository for spent fuel and high-level waste at Yucca Mountain, and the commercial nuclear industry considers constructing a facility in Utah for temporary storage of spent fuel from some of its nuclear waste plants.