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Conceptual Structure of Performance Assessments Conducted for the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 1992

J. C. Helton ,
M. G. Marietta  and
R. P. Rechard
J. C. Helton
Affiliation:
Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ, 85287
R. P. Rechard
Affiliation:
Sandia National Laboratories, Albuquerque, NM 87185
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Abstract

The Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) in southeastern New Mexico is being developed by the U.S. Department of Energy as a disposal facility for trans-uranic waste. In support of this project, Sandia National Laboratories is conducting an ongoing performance assessment (PA) for the WIPP. The ordered triple representation for risk proposed by Kaplan and Garrick is used to provide a clear conceptual structure for this PA. This presentation describes how the preceding representation provides a basis in the WIPP PA for (1) the definition of scenarios and the calculation of scenario probabilities and consequences, (2) the separation of subjective and stochastic uncertainties, (3) the construction of the complementary cumulative distribution functions required in comparisons with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's standard for the geologic disposal of radioactive waste (i.e., 40 CFR Part 191, Subpart B), and (4) the performance of uncertainty and sensitivity studies. Results obtained in a preliminary PA for the WIPP completed in December of 1991 are used for illustration.

Type
Research Article
Information
MRS Online Proceedings Library (OPL) , Volume 294: Symposium V – Scientific Basis for Nuclear Waste Management XVI , 1992 , 885
Copyright
Copyright © Materials Research Society 1993

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