Quantom - a New Methodology for Scanning of Unopened Nuclear Waste Packages

Abstract

The management and safe disposal of low and intermediate level radioactive waste requires knowledge of its inventory with regards to chemically toxic and non-toxic substances. To avoid pollution of underground water reserves, the amount of chemotoxic inventory in a repository is restricted. Derived from this restriction the waste acceptance requirements of each repository define acceptable limits regarding the mass amount of chemically hazardous substances in single or multiple waste packages. In addition to the standard radiological characterization, every waste package has to be characterized with respect to its chemical composition to comply with these requirements.In principle, hazardous substances may be quantified from traceability and quality controls performed during the waste production and conditioning processes. However, worldwide there are a lot of historical waste packages for which only poor or even no information or documentation is available. There is an increasing need for a retrospective characterization in order to fulfill the acceptance criteria for final disposal or a safe long time interim storage. The speaker will give an introduction to an innovative non-destructive method for multi-element detection based on prompt and delayed neutron activation analysis. This advanced technology offers a new methodology for the scanning of unopened waste packages and allows the identification as well as quantification of the waste matrix elements or hazardous substances.