The separations technology and transmutation systems (STATS) report — Implications for nuclear power growth and energy sufficiency

In 1991, as part of the reexamination of Separations and Transmutation (S&T) systems, DOE, requested the National Research Council (NRC) to appoint an NAS Committee to conduct a broad systems review of the application of S&T concepts to radioactive waste disposal. The scope of the study was to prepare a peer reviewed report evaluating the relative effects, costs, and feasibility of employing S&T in the DOE programs for managing (1) spent nuclear fuel from power reactors, and (2) radioactive wastes from selected existing defense production reactor sites. The STATS study did not include a system wide evaluation of the advantages of spent fuel recycling: its ability to reduce the toxicity of high-level waste from hundreds of thousands of years to hundreds of years; its ability to greatly increase the repository capacity; its potential economic advantages; its resistance to proliferation; and its ability to provide a greatly expanded energy supply for the US and the world. This paper provides a detailed review of the recommendations in the STATS report, addresses the limitations of the study, and provides suggested areas for future evaluations to improve the usefulness of the study and its results.