• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.54 no.6
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• pp.2062-2066
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• 2022

Nuclear energy sources are indispensable in cost effectively achieving carbon neutral economy, where public opinion is critical to adoption as the consequences of nuclear accident can be catastrophic. In this context, discussion on spent nuclear fuel is a prerequisite to expanding nuclear energy, as it leads to the issue of radioactive waste disposal. Given the dearth of study on spent nuclear fuel public acceptance, we use text mining and big data analysis on the news article and public comments data on Naver news portal to identify the Korean public opinion on spent nuclear fuel. We identify that the Korean public is more interested in the nuclear energy policy than spent nuclear fuel itself and that the alternative energy sources affect the position towards spent nuclear fuel. We recommend relating spent nuclear fuel issue with nuclear energy policy and environmental issues of alternative energy sources to further promote spent nuclear fuel.

• Journal of Nuclear Fuel Cycle and Waste Technology(JNFCWT)
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• v.7 no.1
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• pp.49-62
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• 2009

Social Acceptance is important to decide policy of spent nuclear fuel management. The idea of a public sphere as a receptacle of dynamic process is the core in this discussion. The purpose of this study is to examine the concept, participants, the conflict-structure and agreeable conditions of a public sphere. A public sphere means in this paper, mechanism and systems that various stakeholders' and public's participation with spontaneous will can affect decision-making process. For good designing and implementing a public sphere, it is necessary to analysis and cope with political, foreign and security, economic, sociocultural environments, the law and systems around spent nuclear fuel management.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.53 no.2
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• pp.549-561
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• 2021

Indonesia has policies and strategies for the management of radioactive waste and spent nuclear fuel that arises from the use of nuclear research and development facilities, including three research reactors, and the use of radioisotopes in medicine and industries. The Indonesian government has provided extensive facilities such as an independent regulatory organization (BAPETEN) and a centralized radioactive waste management organization (CRWT-BATAN). Further, the presence of regulations and several international conventions guarantee the protection of the public from all risks due to handling radioactive waste and spent nuclear fuel. However, the sustainability of radioactive waste management in the future faces various challenges, such as disposal issues related to not only to site selection but also financing of radioactive waste management. Likewise, the problem of transportation persists; as an archipelago country, Indonesia still struggles to manage the infrastructure required for the transport of radioactive materials. The waste from the production of the radioisotopes, especially from the production of 99Mo, requires special attention because BATAN has never handled it. Indonesia should also resolve the management of NORM from various activities. In Indonesia, the definition of radioactive waste does not include NORM. Therefore, the management of this waste needs revision and improvement on the regulations, infrastructure, and technology.

• Journal of Nuclear Fuel Cycle and Waste Technology
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• v.1 no.1
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• pp.1-7
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• 2013

The safe management of radioactive waste is a national task required for sustainable generation of nuclear power and for energy self-reliance in Korea. Since the initial introduction of nuclear power to Korea in 1978, rapid growth in nuclear power has been achieved. This large nuclear power generation program has produced a significant amount of radioactive waste, both low- and intermediate-level waste (LILW) and spent nuclear fuel (SNF); and the amount of waste is steadily growing. For the management of LILW, the Wolsong LILW Disposal Center, which has a final waste disposal capacity of 800,000 drums, is under construction, and is expected to be completed by June 2014. Korean policy about how to manage the SNF has not yet been decided. In 2004, the Atomic Energy Commission decided that a national policy for SNF management should be established considering both technological development and public consensus. Currently, SNF is being stored at reactor sites under the responsibility of plant operator. The at-reactor SNF storage capacity will run out starting in 2024. In this paper, the fundamental principles and steps for implementation of a Korean policy for national radioactive waste management are introduced. Korean practices and prospects regarding radioactive waste management are also summarized, with a focus on strategy for policy-making on SNF management.

• Journal of Nuclear Fuel Cycle and Waste Technology(JNFCWT)
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• v.4 no.3
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• pp.285-299
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• 2006

At the end of 2005, 443 nuclear reactors were operating in 32 countries worldwide. They had provided about 3,000 TWh, which was just over 16 percent of global electricity supply. With the generating capacity of 368 GWe in 2004, the spent fuel generation rate worldwide, now becomes at about 11,000 tHM/y. Projections indicate that cumulative amounts to be generated by the year 2020, the time when most of the existing NPP will be closed to the end of their licensed lifetime, may be close to 445,000 tHM. In this regard, spent fuel management is a common issue in all countries with nuclear reactors. Whatever their national policy and/or strategy is selected for the backend of the nuclear fuel cycle, the management of spent fuel will contribute an impending and imminent issues to be resolved in the foreseeable future. The 2nd Review Meeting of the Contracting Parties to the Joint Convention was held in Vienna from 15 to 24 May 2006. The meeting gave an opportunity to exchange information on the national policy and strategy of spent fuel management of the Contracting Parties, to discuss their situations, prospects and the major factors influencing the national policies in this field and to identify the most important directions that national efforts and international co-operation in this area should be taken. In this paper, an overview of national and global trends of spent fuel management is discussed. In addition, some directions are identified and recent activities of each Member States in the subject area are summarized.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.40 no.1
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• pp.9-20
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• 2008

Since plutonium accounts for 40-50% of the power produced by uranium fuels, spent fuel contains only residual plutonium. Management of this plutonium is one of the aspects influencing the choice of a fuel cycle back-end option: reprocessing, direct disposal or wait-and-see. Different grades and qualities of plutonium exist depending from their specific generation conditions; all are valuable fissile material. Safeguard authorities watch the inventories of civil plutonium, but access to those data is restricted. Independent evaluations have led to an estimated current inventory of 220t plutonium in total (spent fuel, separated civil plutonium and military plutonium). If used as MOX fuel, it would be sufficient to feed all the PWRs and BWRs worldwide during 7 years or to deploy a FBR park corresponding to 150% of today' s installed nuclear capacity worldwide, which could then be exploited for centuries with the current stockpile of depleted and spent uranium. The energy potential of plutonium deteriorates with storage time of spent fuel and of separated plutonium, due to the decay of $^{241}Pu$, the best fissile isotope, into americium, a neutron absorber. The loss of fissile value of plutonium is more pronounced for usage in LWRs than in FBR. However, keeping the current plutonium inventory for an expected future deployment of FBRs is counterproductive. Recycling plutonium reduce the required volume for final disposal in an underground repository and the cost of final disposal. However, the benefits of utilizing an energy resource and of reducing final disposal liabilities are not the only aspects that determine the choice of a back-end policy.

• Journal of Nuclear Fuel Cycle and Waste Technology(JNFCWT)
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• v.13 no.4
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• pp.243-251
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• 2015

Nuclear power is currently the second largest power supply method in Korea and the number of nuclear power plants are planned to be increased as well. However, clear management policy for spent fuels generated from nuclear power plants has not yet been established. The back-end fuel cycle, associated with nuclear material flow after nuclear reactors is a collection of technologies designed for the spent fuel management and the spent fuel management policy is closely related with the selection of a nuclear fuel cycle. Cost is an important consideration in selection of a nuclear fuel cycle and should be determined by adding external cost to private cost. Unlike the private cost, which is a direct cost, studies on the external cost are focused on nuclear reactors and not at the nuclear fuel cycle. In this research, external cost indicators applicable to nuclear fuel cycle were derived and quantified. OT (once through), DUPIC (Direct Use of PWR SF in CANDU), PWR-MOX (PWR PUREX reprocessing), and Pyro-SFR (SFR recycling with pyroprocessing) were selected as nuclear fuel cycles which could be considered for estimating external cost in Korea. Energy supply security cost, accident risk cost, and acceptance cost were defined as external cost according to precedent and estimated after analyzing approaches which have been adopted for estimating external costs on nuclear power generation.

• Journal of Radiation Protection and Research
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• v.25 no.2
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• pp.89-96
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• 2000

Nuclear fuel cycle choices and costs are important in considering energy policies, fuel diversity, security of supply and associated social and environmental impacts. Particularly, the nuclear spent fuel is very important in view of high activity and the need of long term management. This study focuses on the comparison of reprocessing and direct disposal of nuclear spent fuel in terms of cost, safety and public acceptability. The results of the study show that the direct disposal is about 7% more economical than the reprocessing. In terms of safety, the results show that the risk of vitrified HLW (high-level radioactive waste) is less than directly disposed spent fuel. For the public acceptability, both of the methods are not well understood and therefore they are not accepted. In conclusion, it is necessary to guarantee the safety of the both spent fuel processing methods through continuous development of associated technology and to have a fuel cycle policy which should consider not only the economics but also social and environmental impacts.

• Journal of Nuclear Fuel Cycle and Waste Technology(JNFCWT)
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• v.16 no.1
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• pp.65-82
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• 2018

With the significant increase in spent ion-exchange resin generation, to meet the requirements of Waste Acceptance Criteria (WAC) of the Wolsong disposal facility in Korea, blending is considered as a method for enhancing disposal options for intermediate level waste from nuclear reactors. A mass balance formula approach was used to enable blending process with an appropriate mixing ratio. As a result, it is estimated around 44.3% of high activity spent resins can be blended with the overall volume of low activity spent resins at a 1:7.18 conservative blending ratio. In contrast, the reduction of high activity spent resins is considered a positive solution in reducing the amount of spent resins stored. In an economic study, the blending process has been proven to lower the disposal cost by 10% compared to current APR1400 treatment. Prior to commencing use of this blending method in Korea, coordinated discussion, and safety and health assessment should be undertaken to investigate the feasibility of fitting this blending method to national policy as a means of waste predisposal processing and management in the future.

• Journal of Nuclear Fuel Cycle and Waste Technology(JNFCWT)
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• v.5 no.4
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• pp.339-350
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• 2007

Status on the spent nuclear fuel management policy and R&D plan of the major countries is surveyed. Also the prospect of the future R&D plan is suggested. Recently so-called fuel cycle nations, which have the reprocess policy of the spent fuel, announced new spent fuel management policy based on the advanced fuel cycle technology. The policy is focused to transmute highly radioactive material and material having a very long half-life, and to recycle the Pu and U contained in the spent fuel. In this way the radio-foxily of the spent fuel as well as the amount of the high level waste to be eventually disposed can greatly be reduced. Most of countries selected the wet process as a primary option for the treatment of the spent fuel since the advanced wet process, which is based on the existing PUREX process, looks more feasible as compared with the dry process. The wet process, however, is much more sensitive in terms of proliferation-resistance compared with the dry process. The pure Pu can easily be obtained by simply modifying the process. On the other hand the pure Pu can not be extracted in the dry process based on the high temperature molten salt process such as a pyroprocess. Even though the pyroprocess technology is very premature, it has a great merit. Thus it is necessary for Korea to have a long term strategy for pursuing a spent fuel treatment technology with a proliferation resistance and a great merit for the GEN-IV fuel cycles. Pyroprocess is one of the best candidates to satisfy these purposes.