physics

West Valley Demonstration Project

West Valley Demonstration Project is a physics topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand West Valley Demonstration Project rather than just read about it. In short: The West Valley Demonstration Project is a nuclear waste remediation site in West Valley, New York in the U.S. state of New York. The project focuses on the cleanup and containment of radioactive waste left behind after the abandonment of a commercial nuclear fuel reprocessing plant in 1980.

Key takeaways

West Valley Demonstration Project belongs to physics; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect West Valley Demonstration Project to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of West Valley Demonstration Project from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

The West Valley Demonstration Project is a nuclear waste remediation site in West Valley, New York in the U.S. state of New York. The project focuses on the cleanup and containment of radioactive waste left behind after the abandonment of a commercial nuclear fuel reprocessing plant in 1980. The project was created by an Act of Congress in 1980 and is directed to be a cooperative effort between the United States Department of Energy and the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority. Despite over 30 years of cleanup efforts and billions of dollars having been spent at the site, the West Valley Demonstration Project property was described as "arguably Western New York's most toxic location" in 2013.

History

1965 to 1980: Commercial operations by Nuclear Fuel Services, Inc. The State of New York acquired 3,345 acres (13.54 km2) of land in the Town of Ashford, near West Valley, in 1961 with the intention of developing an atomic industrial area. The property was named the Western New York Nuclear Service Center and would eventually host a commercial spent nuclear fuel reprocessing plant and low-level radioactive waste disposal site that was operated by Nuclear Fuel Services, Inc. Nuclear Fuel Services was a subsidiary of the W.R. Grace Company in 1963, when the Atomic Energy Commission granted the company the necessary permits to reprocess spent fuel at the West Valley site. The first shipments of spent fuel arrived at the site in 1965, and reprocessing began the next year. In 1969, Nuclear Fuel Services was acquired by Getty Oil.

The plant reprocessed spent reactor fuel at the site from 1966 to 1972. During this time period, the facility processed 1,983.7 kilograms (4,373 lb) of plutonium and 625.7 metric tons (1,379,000 lb) of spent uranium. Using the PUREX process, the plant was able to recover 1,926 kilograms (4,246 lb) of plutonium and 620 metric tons (1,370,000 lb) of uranium. Most of the recovered uranium was depleted or slightly enriched; only 0.9 metric tons (2,000 lb) was highly enriched. The reprocessing of fuel also resulted in the accumulation of 660,000 US gallons (2,500 m3) of high-level radioactive waste in an underground storage tank. An additional 15 acres (0.061 km2) of the property was licensed by New York State for burial of low-level radioactive waste in 20-foot (6.1 m) deep trenches. After reprocessing operations ceased in 1972, Nuclear Fuel Services continued to accept low-level radioactive waste for disposal at the site until it was discovered that contaminated water was leaking from the trenches. Nuclear Fuel Services was unable to obtain regulatory approval to remove and treat the contaminated water, and stopped accepting waste for burial in 1975. In total, approximately 2,400,000 cubic feet (68,000 m3) of low-level waste was buried at the site. Escalating regulation required plant modifications which were deemed uneconomic by Nuclear Fuel Services, who ceased all operations at the facility in 1976. After Nuclear Fuel Services' lease expired in 1980, the site and its accumulated waste became the responsibility of New York State. The former plant remains the only privately owned nuclear fuel reprocessing center to have ever operated in the United States. Two additional private nuclear fuel reprocessing plants were constructed (one by General Electric in Morris, Illinois, and another by Allied General Nuclear Services in Barnwell, South Carolina), but were never permitted to operate. Other reprocessing plants in the United States have been operated by the U.S. Department of Energy rather than private companies.

1980 to present: U.S. Department of Energy's West Valley Demonstration Project The West Valley Demonstration Project Act (Public Law 96-368) was passed by the United States Congress in 1980, and directed the United States Department of Energy to lead the task of solidifying and removing the accumulated nuclear waste present on the site, in addition to decontaminating and decommissioning the facility and surrounding property. The processes used to solidify and contain the site's nuclear waste were intended to demonstrate strategies that could be used at other cleanup sites. On October 1, 1980, the U.S. Department of Energy entered into a cooperative agreement with the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority to determine an operational framework for cleanup activities at the site. The agreement specified that the USDOE would take the lead on the project and obtain exclusive control over the site's 175-acre (0.71 km2) high-security core area, while NYSERDA would represent New York State's interests in the project and manage the remainder of the site's property. It also stipulated that the U.S. Federal Government would pay for 90% of the project's costs, with New York State paying the remainder. Site operations began in February 1982, after West Valley Nuclear Services Company, Inc. (then a subsidiary of Westinghouse Electric Corporation) was chosen by the USDOE as the primary contractor for work to be done at the West Valley Demonstration Project.

See also Nuclear fuel Nuclear fuel cycle Sellafield COGEMA La Hague site

References

External links

U.S. Department of Energy's West Valley Demonstration Project website West Valley Demonstration Project Annual Site Environmental Report for Calendar Year 2013 1977 Congressional hearing on decommissioning WVDP Cooperative Agreement between the U.S. Department of Energy and the New York State Energy Research and Development Agency 2010 Final Environmental Impact Statement for Decommissioning and/or Long-Term Stewardship at the West Valley Demonstration Project and Western New York Nuclear Service Center Entry from the Center for Land Use Interpretation's exhibit "Perpetual Architecture: Uranium Disposal Cells of America" 1960s film by Nuclear Fuel Services about their West Valley facility West Valley Citizen Task Force The Coalition on West Valley Wastes

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with West Valley Demonstration Project

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what West Valley Demonstration Project claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In physics, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to West Valley Demonstration Project before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about West Valley Demonstration Project ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of West Valley Demonstration Project

In research: West Valley Demonstration Project appears in physics research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses West Valley Demonstration Project in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: West Valley Demonstration Project is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics Buildings and structures in Cattaraugus County, New York, Nuclear fuel infrastructure in the United States, Nuclear reprocessing sites, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for West Valley Demonstration Project outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study West Valley Demonstration Project in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what West Valley Demonstration Project means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain West Valley Demonstration Project out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is West Valley Demonstration Project in simple terms?

Why does West Valley Demonstration Project matter?

Because it connects several physics ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study West Valley Demonstration Project?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on West Valley Demonstration Project.