Jeremy L. Dillon
RW Monitor
3/21/2014
A former Ontario Power Generation employee claims that OPG’s calculations for radionuclide inventories that would go into its proposed Deep Geological Repository, located in Kincardine, Ont., underestimate the waste’s true values. The charge comes from Frank Greening, a retired research scientist for OPG since 1978, in a letter dated Jan. 6 to the Canadian review panel responsible for the licensing of the facility. “The specific activities published by OPG and the NWMO for radionuclide inventories associated with CANDU pressure tube refurbishment waste are seriously underestimated, sometimes by factors of more than 100,” Greening wrote in the letter, which was recently made public. “This discrepancy stems from undue reliance on calculations that do not properly account for neutron activation processes occurring in pressure tube material exposed to high neutron fluences in chemically aggressive environments such as high temperature lithiated D20.”
Greening told RW Monitor this week that he sent additional letters to the panel claiming additional waste streams calculations besides the pressure tube refurbishment waste were also incorrect. In a follow up letter to the Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency, the entity responsible for licensing the DGR, Greening commented on the potential mistakes. “The use of incomplete or erroneous calculations of radionuclide inventories in waste slated for disposal in a DGR cannot be dismissed as a minor oversight that is capable of a ‘quick fix,’” Greening wrote. “On the contrary, it constitutes a regulatory non-compliance that needs to be dispositioned. Furthermore, I believe that the sources of computational errors in OPG’s estimated radionuclide inventory for pressure tube waste are present in other CANDU wastes such as calandria components, steam generators and spent ion exchange resins. I am therefore calling for the establishment of an “extent of condition assessment” of all reported radionuclide inventories in waste slated for emplacement in Canada’s first DGR,” he wrote.
According to OPG, Greening’s analysis is under consideration. “Dr. Greening’s analysis is currently being reviewed,” OPG spokesman Neil Kelly said. “It’s one of many inputs into OPG’s on-going analysis. I would also say some of Dr. Greening’s data sources appear to be based on outdated information. He does have some references and numbers from the 1980’s. However, some of his other points are valid. We are already under review in OPG for future revisions to the waste inventory. The very nature of the hearing process is to allow healthy discussion, and it invites voices like Dr. Greening’s to be raised up and contemplated. At the end of the day, the truth is the best outcome,” he said. OPG also would not be this far along in the licensing process if it did not have detailed, well-considered research, Kelly said.
Repository Would be Located Close to Lake Huron
The proposed repository would be located beneath Ontario Power Generation’s Bruce nuclear facility. OPG plans on storing low and intermediate waste from its Bruce, Pickering, and Darlington power stations at the proposed repository, which would be located 680 meters (approximately 744 yards) below the surface in an isolated rock formation of shale and limestone. Geologist Ian Clark, who conducted a study on the possible site, told RW Monitor last year, “We have the gold star. We have the best site in the world so far.” He added, “The rocks have no fractures so there isn’t any flow of groundwater. The pores are very small and very tight so it is very hard to get water to flow through them, and this is what makes it a good site.”
However, the review of the proposal to build the DGR has had its fair share of complaints. Most notably, a portion of the Michigan congressional delegation wrote to Secretary of State John Kerry back in October calling on the U.S. government to intervene to prevent the construction of the facility. Currently, the licensing of the facility is under review by a Joint Review Panel under the Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency. After the public comment period, the review panel will submit an environmental assessment report within 90 days to the federal Minister of the Environment with its recommendations for the path forward. Once the federal government gives the go-ahead, the review panel can issue a license to prepare a site and construct a deep geological repository.
