Department of Energy Spent Fuel Shipping Campaigns: Comparisons of Transportation Plans and Lessons Learned

Presented at WM'03 Conference, Tucson, AZ, February 23-27, 2003

Over the last 30 years, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) has successfully and safely transported
shipments of spent nuclear fuel over America's highways and railroads. During that time, an exemplary
safety record has been established with no identifiable fatalities, injuries, or environmental damage caused
by the radioactive nature of the shipments. This paper evaluates some rail and truck shipping campaigns,
planning processes, and selected transportation plans to identify lessons learned in terms of planning and
programmatic activities. The intent of this evaluation is to document best practices from current processes
and previous plans for DOE programs preparing or considering future plans. DOE’s National
Transportation Program (NTP) reviewed 13 plans, beginning with core debris shipments from Three Mile
Island to current, ongoing fuel campaigns. This paper describes lessons learned in the areas of: emergency
planning, planning information, security, shipment prenotification, emergency notification/response,
terrorism/sabotage risk, and recovery and cleanup, as well as routing, security, carrier/driver requirements,
transportation operational contingencies, tracking, inspections and safe parking.