Nuclear Materials Disposition & Used Fuel Storage

The safe and secure storage, handling and permanent disposition of used nuclear fuel and plutonium materials are long-standing missions at SRS.

H Area Nuclear Materials Disposition

H Canyon is the only operating, production-scale, radiologically-shielded chemical separations facility in the United States. The facility’s operations historically recovered uranium and neptunium from fuel tubes used in nuclear reactors at the Savannah River Site, to produce radioactive materials used in making nuclear weapons. After the end of the Cold War, the facility’s mission changed to one of nonproliferation and environmental cleanup.

The interior of the facility resembles a canyon, giving the facility its name. Most canyon operations are done from a control room using remote control cranes. One side of the canyon is considered “hot” because it has higher radiation levels, while the other side of the canyon is “warm” because it has lower radiation levels. No one has been inside the “hot” side of the canyon since it began operations.

Employees who work in the building are protected from radiation by the thick, steel-reinforced concrete walls. Irradiated used fuel rods are transported to H Canyon in shielded cask cars from L Area storage.

The facility was constructed and began operations in the 1950s, with equipment and components that were interchangeable and flexible enough to perform a variety of different used nuclear fuel dissolution missions. Most recently, the canyon has been dissolving used nuclear fuel that has been stored on-site and disposing of the resulting solution through the liquid waste program. There, the waste will be vitrified and safely stored on-site until a federal repository is identified.

Although it is over 70 years old, H Canyon has maintained and proven the flexibility originally intended for it, by adapting to the needs of its customers. H Canyon is a one-of-a-kind national asset that is serving the state, the nation and the world by processing weapon-grade nuclear materials for final disposition out of South Carolina. As a result, H Canyon will remain in a high state of readiness with associated technical staff to complete its designated missions.

Used Fuel Storage

Since 1996, the L Area Disassembly Basin, or L Basin, has been receiving and storing used nuclear fuel (SNF) assemblies in an underwater storage facility housed in the old L Area Reactor at SRS.

SNF is sent to L Basin from off-site foreign and domestic research reactors. Since beginning operations, the facility has received over 12,000 SNF assemblies, with fuel types including high and low enriched uranium used fuel. This fuel makes up about 27.5 metric tons of heavy metal in used fuel.

The fuel is stored in the basin until the SRS H Canyon chemical separations facility is ready to process it. The fuel is then removed from the basin and placed on a railcar for on-site transfer to H Canyon.

L Basin has concrete walls two-and-a-half to seven-feet thick and holds approximately 3.4 million gallons of water, with pool depths of 17-30 feet. The basin water provides shielding to protect workers from radiation, as all used fuel assemblies have low enough radioactivity, or are “cool” enough, to be safely stored without an active cooling water system.