Presentation made at International Conference on The Management of Spent Nuclear Fuel from Nuclear Power Reactors, An Integrated approach to the Back-End of the Fuel Cycle (IAEA-CN-226). The purpose of the conference was to highlight the importance of an integrated long-term approach to the management of spent fuel from nuclear power reactors.

To establish a new organization to manage nuclear waste, provide a consensual process for siting nuclear waste facilities, ensure adequate funding for managing nuclear waste, and for other purposes.

The Nuclear Waste Administration Act of 2013 discussion draft is intended to implement the recommendations of the Blue Ribbon Commission on America’s Nuclear Future to establish a nuclear waste administration and create a consent-based process for siting nuclear waste facilities. The bill enables the federal government to fulfill its commitment to managing nuclear waste, ending the costly liability the government bears for its failure to dispose of commercial spent fuel.

This paper presents an assessment of the benefits for extended burnup credit in transporting
pressurized-water-reactor (PWR) spent nuclear fuel (SNF) in the United States. A prototypic 32-
assembly cask and the current regulatory guidance were used as bases for this assessment. By
comparing recently released PWR discharge data with actinide-only-based loading curves, this
evaluation shows that additional negative reactivity (through either increased credit for fuel burnup or

In General: The Nuclear Waste Administration Act of 2013 includes most of the language of S.3469, the Nuclear Waste Administration Act of 2012. The most significant change in the 2013 bill is the provision linking construction and siting of a consolidated storage facility to progress on a repository. The 2012 Act prohibited storage of any spent nuclear fuel beyond 10,000 metric tons until the Administration concluded a repository consent agreement.

Following the proposals for nuclear fuel assurance of International Atomic Energy
Agency (IAEA) Director General Mohamed ElBaradei, former Russian President Vladimir V.
Putin, and U.S. President George W. Bush, joint committees of the Russian Academy of
Sciences (RAS) and the U.S. National Academies (NAS) were formed to address these and other
fuel assurance concepts and their links to nonproliferation goals. The joint committees also
addressed many technology issues relating to the fuel assurance concepts. This report provides

In July 1999, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) Spent Fuel Project Office
(SFPO) issued Interim Staff Guidance 8 Revision 1 (ISG8R1) to provide recommendations for the use
of burnup credit in storage and transport of pressurized-water reactor (PWR) spent fuel. Subsequent to
the issuance of ISG8R1, the NRC Office of Regulatory Research (RES) has directed an effort to
investigate the technical basis for extending the criteria and recommendations of ISG8R1 to allow

On April 25, 2013, Senators Wyden, Alexander, Feinstein, and Murkowski released a draft bill to create a sustainable, participatory process for managing nuclear waste. The senators requested comments and suggestions on the draft bill, as well as on the alternative language for siting an interim storage facility proposed by Senators Alexander and Feinstein. In addition, the senators posed eight questions on which they sought comments.

The benefits of burnup credit and the technical issues associated with utilizing burnup credit in spent
nuclear fuel (SNF) casks have been studied in the United States for almost two decades. The issuance of the
U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) staff guidance for actinide-only burnup credit in 2002 was a
significant step toward providing a regulatory framework for using burnup credit in transport casks. However,
adherence to the current regulatory guidance (e.g., limit credit to actinides) enables only about 30% of the existing

Presentation made at International Conference on The Management of Spent Nuclear Fuel from Nuclear Power Reactors, An Integrated approach to the Back-End of the Fuel Cycle (IAEA-CN-226). The purpose of the conference was to highlight the importance of an integrated long-term approach to the management of spent fuel from nuclear power reactors.

Presentation made at International Conference on The Management of Spent Nuclear Fuel from Nuclear Power Reactors, An Integrated approach to the Back-End of the Fuel Cycle (IAEA-CN-226). The purpose of the conference was to highlight the importance of an integrated long-term approach to the management of spent fuel from nuclear power reactors.

Presentation made at International Conference on The Management of Spent Nuclear Fuel from Nuclear Power Reactors, An Integrated approach to the Back-End of the Fuel Cycle (IAEA-CN-226). The purpose of the conference was to highlight the importance of an integrated long-term approach to the management of spent fuel from nuclear power reactors.