NEW 3.9-L DRY CONTAINER IN COMPLIANCE WITH DOE M 441.1-1, NUCLEAR MATERIAL PACKAGING MANUAL

In this paper the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) National Nuclear Security Administration’s (NNSA’s) Y-12 National Security Complex (Y-12) Packaging Engineering section presents a 3.9-L dry container designed to meet the testing requirements in the DOE M 441.1-1 Nuclear Material Packaging Manual for uranium oxide storage.1 The 3.9-L dry container is designed for long-term storage. It is easily decontaminated and has no degrading components (filters, O-rings, or gaskets) and uses an interlocking lid that can accommodate a wire type of tamper indication device. Dynamic impact modeling shows the 3.9-L dry container should exceed all of the impact and release requirements for uranium oxide in DOE M 441.1-1. This design may be modified into a family of containers of different heights and diameters. Also, replacing the sealing plug with one that uses an O-ring and high efficiency particulate air (HEPA) filter creates a new type of container. This sealed and filtered container would not only store moist contents at Y-12 but also could store plutonium for DOE/NNSA. Y-12 is working on optimizing the manufacturing of the container body used on both designs.