Experimental Study on the Effects of Fault Movement on the Engineered Barrier System

An experimental approach is introduced for understanding how the engineered barriers of a deep geological repository system are affected by fault movement. The experiments are conducted using laboratory simulation test equipment. So far, the experiments indicate that the metal overpack is rotated within the bentonite buffer due to its plasticity, but not breached. Numerical modeling is also developed to supplement the range of the experiments, which is limited by the capability of the test equipment.