Evaluation of source term parameters for spent fuel disposal in foreign countries, 1; Instant release fraction from spent fuel matrices and composition materials for fuel assemblies

Nagata, Masanobu; Chikazawa, Takahiro*; Akahori, Kuniaki*; Kitamura, Akira  ; Tachi, Yukio  

Although spent nuclear fuel is planned to be disposed after reprocessing and vitrification of high-level radioactive waste (HLW), feasibility study on direct disposal of spent nuclear fuel (SF) has been started as an alternative option to flexibly apply change of future energy situation in Japan. Radionuclide inventories and their release behavior after breaching spent fuel container should be assessed to confirm safety of the SF disposal. However, these detailed studies have not been performed in Japan. Therefore, we investigated some foreign safety assessment reports on direct disposal of spent nuclear fuel by focusing on the source term of the fast release of radionuclides (i.e. instant release fraction; IRF) for the purpose of contributing to the safety assessment of Japanese SF disposal system. As a result of comparison between the safety assessment reports in foreign countries, although some fundamental data have been referred to the reports in common, the final source term dataset (IRF) was seen differences between countries in the result of taking into account the national circumstances (Reactor type and burnup, etc.). We also found the difference of assignment of uncertainties among the investigated reports; a report selected pessimistic values and another report selected mean values and their deviations. It is expected that these findings are useful as fundamental information for determination of the release rates for the safety assessment of Japanese SF disposal system.