What is low-level radioactive waste?
“Low-Level” Radioactive Waste includes: Irradiated Components and Piping: reactor hardware and pipes that are in continual contact with highly radioactive water for the 20 to 30 years the reactor operates. The metal becomes “activated” or radioactive itself from bombardment by neutrons that are released when energy is produced. Also called Irradiated Primary System Components. Control Rods: from the core of nuclear power plants–rods that regulate and stop the nuclear reactions in the reactor core. Poison Curtains: which absorb neutrons from the water in the reactor core and irradiated fuel (high level waste) pool. Resins, Sludges, Filters and Evaporator Bottoms: from cleansing the water that circulates around the irradiated fuel in the reactor vessel and in the fuel pool, which holds the irradiated fuel when it is removed from the core. Entire Nuclear Power Plants if and when they are dismantled. This includes, for example, from a typical 1,000 megawatt nuclear reactor building floor:
Low-level radioactive waste streams contain source, special nuclear, or byproduct material that are acceptable for disposal in a near-surface (i.e., within the upper 30 meters of the earth’s surface) land disposal facility. For the purposes of this definition, low-level waste has the same meaning as in the Low-Level Radioactive Waste Policy Act, that is, radioactive waste not classified as high-level radioactive waste, transuranic waste, spent nuclear fuel, or byproduct material as defined in section 11e.(2) of the Atomic Energy Act (i.e., uranium or thorium tailings and waste). Industries; hospitals and medical, educational, or research institutions; private or government laboratories; and nuclear fuel cycle facilities (e.g., nuclear power reactors and fuel fabrication plants) that use radioactive materials generate low-level wastes as part of their normal operations. These waste streams are generated in many physical and chemical forms and levels of contamination.
