Westinghouse-DOE integration: Meeting the challenge

摘要

The Westinghouse Electric Corporation (WEC) is in a unique position to affect national environmental management policy approaching the 21st Century. Westinghouse companies are management and operating contractors (MOC,s) at several environmentally pivotal government-owned, contractor operated (GOCO) facilities within the Department of Energy's (DOE's) nuclear defense complex. One way the WEC brings its companies together is by activating teams to solve specific DOE site problems. For example, one challenging issue at DOE facilities involves the environmentally responsible, final disposal of transuranic and high-level nuclear wastes (TRUs and HLWS). To address these disposal issues, the DOE supports two Westinghouse-based task forces: The TRU Waste Acceptance Criteria Certification Committee (WACCC) and the HLW Vitrification Committee. The WACCC is developing methods to characterize an estimated 176,287 cubic meters of retrievably stored TRUs generated at DOE production sites. Once characterized, TRUs could be safely deposited in the WIPP repository. The Westinghouse HLW Vitrification Committee is dedicated to assess appropriate methods to process an estimated 380,702 cubic meters of HLWs currently stored in underground storage tanks (USTs). As planned, this processing will involve segregating, and appropriately treating, low level waste (LLW) and HLW tank constituents for eventual disposal. The first unit designed to process these nuclear wastes is the SRS Defense Waste Processing Facility (DWPF). Initiated in 1973, the DWPF project is scheduled to begin operations in 1991 or 1992. Westinghouse companies are also working together to achieve appropriate environmental site restoration at DOE sites via the GOCO Environmental Restoration Committee.