Papers Special Issue: Supporting the Safe Interim Storage of High-level Nuclear Waste Through Science and Engineering

High-level nuclear waste byproducts incident to nuclear weaponmaterials production are managed within the U.S. Departmentof Energy (DOE) Complex. A signifi cant portion of this highlevelwaste (HLW) is stored as liquid-sludge mixtures in large, undergroundcarbon steel tanks located at the Savannah River Sitein South Carolina and at the Hanford site in Washington. Lesserquantities of waste are managed at the Idaho National Laboratoryand at the West Valley Demonstration Project in New York. TheDOE has used the West Valley Demonstration Project to processhigh-level wastes resulting from spent commercial and defensefuel reprocessing into glass. Similar conversion of the liquidwastes to glass has occurred at Savannah River and will occur atHanford in the near future. The liquid wastes produced at Idahohave been calcined to create a granular solid product. The glassand calcined wastes are now stored in stainless steel containersand disposition of these waste products is the fi nal step in the closureof the nuclear fuel cycle. This special issue of the Journal ofNuclear Materials Management summarizes some of the engineeringand science activities related to the management of high-levelnuclear wastes within the DOE Complex.