YMP Preliminary Wet Handling Facility Throughput Study

This study describes the development of a preliminary throughput estimate for a Wet Handling Facility (WHF)/ used fuel repackaging factility. This study estimates the throughput for the WHF License Application design for a repository at Yucca Mountain as of September 2007. This design freeze allowed for the development of the throughput study without having to accommodate for minor updates to the facility design and documentation leading up to the License Application. As analyzed, the WHF is configured to receive, handle, and repackage bare commercial spent nuclear fuel (CSNF), where each fuel assembly will be handled directly and loaded into a transport, aging and disposal canister (TAD). Truck-based transportation casks containing bare CSNF and rail-based transportation casks containing dual-purpose canisters (DPCs) are the primary waste streams allotted for the WHF.
For design flexibility, the WHF will be designed to handle bare CSNF arriving in rail-based transportation casks. Rail transportation casks are not considered to be a primary waste stream. It is presumed that the utilities that can handle and load the relatively large and heavy rail casks have the capability to load TADs; therefore, they do not need to ship CSNF bare but would ship CSNF within TADs. Alternative cases were investigated that included three sizes of rail-based transportation casks containing bare CSNF, where these alternatives were used to assess the sensitivity of the facility to larger capacity bare-fuel transportation casks.