A friend swears that the reactor housed at MIT in Cambridge, which the Grand Junction branch runs parallel to, is mandated by the city to only ship out waste by rail and not by truck. Does anyone have any information on this?
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CSX and atomic waste in Cambridge MA
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Most waste is shipped in containers which are hauled by truck to a railyard and then put onto flat cars on the train, such as the grey containers seen on low-boy trucks entering/exiting Beacon Park in Allston.
MIT may have an itsy-bitsy one, I assume that's what the discussion is about, this isn't cask storage of fuel rods. We had one at Columbia too, middle of Manhattan, just never commissioned. TRIGA, but I'm not sure what those intials stand for anymore. Extremely low output power, tiny amount of fuel, one of these joint AEC-NSF programs from the '60's.
CSX (and now Indiana Eastern) carries the radwaste out of the Fernald Weapons site in Indiana, along former C&O of Indiana. A good googler can find pics of the fernald train headed to yucca mountain. Back when I was in the crane business, I designed the significant parts of the cranes that move the waste containers around the fernald site before they are loaded on the train, although I've never actually been in the site.
The new Acela: It's not Aveliable.
Tadman> I did not think they had Yucca Mtn. in use yet... could be wrong... CSX/CP also pull all of the atmoic waste from the Fermi 2 Power plant in Monroe once a month.... They have to go less than posted speed through Toledo incase of an accident.
Engineer James wrote:Tadman> I did not think they had Yucca Mtn. in use yet... could be wrong... CSX/CP also pull all of the atmoic waste from the Fermi 2 Power plant in Monroe once a month.... They have to go less than posted speed through Toledo incase of an accident.The track to Yucca Mtn. is not yet constructed, and is still under design. In fact if anyone can come up with a good way to get 1,400 ft. strings of welded rail out into the desert without rail or rail access they'd be willing to listen.
DAW
FatNoah wrote:I went to college in Worcester, and we also had a small (< 15kW) reactor as well.Might that be the little open pool research reactor WPI operated back in the late 60's/early 70's?
The entire core assembly was about the size of a microwave oven as I recall. Could probably fit all the waste it would ever generate in a lead-lined briefcase or something....no train required!
FarmallBob wrote:I would think Radio Active Waste would be handled like glass with a lot of cork or something to keep if from bounceing around. Thats my idea as I have never seen these tanks they move it in outher than on tv.FatNoah wrote:I went to college in Worcester, and we also had a small (< 15kW) reactor as well.Might that be the little open pool research reactor WPI operated back in the late 60's/early 70's?
The entire core assembly was about the size of a microwave oven as I recall. Could probably fit all the waste it would ever generate in a lead-lined briefcase or something....no train required!
FarmallBob wrote:Small reactors are a lot of fun; I'm building a tiny one in my basement - so tiny the only way you can tell it's working is with a sensitive neutron detector.FatNoah wrote:I went to college in Worcester, and we also had a small (< 15kW) reactor as well.Might that be the little open pool research reactor WPI operated back in the late 60's/early 70's?
The entire core assembly was about the size of a microwave oven as I recall. Could probably fit all the waste it would ever generate in a lead-lined briefcase or something....no train required!
Mike
abaduck wrote:yeah that or when a few city blocks get cleand off the map.FarmallBob wrote:Small reactors are a lot of fun; I'm building a tiny one in my basement - so tiny the only way you can tell it's working is with a sensitive neutron detector.FatNoah wrote:I went to college in Worcester, and we also had a small (< 15kW) reactor as well.Might that be the little open pool research reactor WPI operated back in the late 60's/early 70's?
The entire core assembly was about the size of a microwave oven as I recall. Could probably fit all the waste it would ever generate in a lead-lined briefcase or something....no train required!
Mike
There are different types of waste shipments. Most items shipped are called "low level waste" which is mainly radioactive contaminated items like pipes, paper, plastic and such. I have several pictures of a Guilford train with 9 cars of this stuff going through Dearfield in 2004. If you didnt read the fine pring on the cars, you wouldnt know what they were carrying. The other type is "high level waste" This is typically spent fuel, control rods, pressure vessels and other items that are neutron irradiated (in addition to being contaminated). These are the items you see in the special cars (shipping container on flat car) that can withstand the 'plausable event' of an aircraft crashing into the car after it has fallen 100 feet and then burnt for an hour in 3000 degree flames (or something like that). These loads are typically sent individually or in unit trains. Rare to see as nobody wants them around for any amount of time. These shipments now are probably going to DOE sites such as Hanford in Washington State or Savannah River in South Carolina. (or other places). These loads are the ones that typically have the guards/ police around. Most of these cars have the "Do not hump" placard on them.
One other item of note. http://www.doedigitalarchive.doe.gov/ has pictures of various types of rail shipments. Some are not standard (ie the tank car being burried, that was a car restricted for use on site) and some are from the '50s or 60s. On the search page, look at Hanford, Savannah river, Idaho and Brookhaven. All four of those (and possibly other places) have pictures of rad waste being shipped. The TMI ones at Idaho are high level, the gondolas at Savannah river are low level (and the same type of load I saw at Dearfield).