The increasing accumulation of spent nuclear fuel has raised interest in High-Level Waste (HLW) repositories. For example, Sweden is under construction of the KBS-3 repository. To ensure the safety of such HLW repository, various countries have been developing assessment models. In the Republic of Korea, the Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute has been developing on the AKRS model. However, traditional safety assessment models have not considered the fracture growth in the far-field host rock as a function of time. As repository safety assessments guarantee safety for million years, sustained stress naturally leads to the progressive growth of fractures as time goes on. Therefore, it becomes essential to account for fracture growth in the surrounding host rock. To address this, our study proposes a new coupling scheme between the Fracture growth model and the radionuclide transport model. That coupling scheme consists of the Cubic Law model as a fracture growth function and the GoldSim code which is a commercial software for radionuclide transport calculations. The model that adopting such fracture growth functions showed an increase of up to 15% in the release of radionuclide compared to traditional assessment models. our observations indicated that crack growth as a function of time led to an increase in hydraulic conductivity that allowed more radionuclide transport. Notably, these findings show the significance of adopting fracture growth models as a critical element in evaluating the safety of nuclear waste repositories.

Three point bending tests of single edge notched beam (SENB) specimens were carried out to evaluate the fracture behavior of the fine-grain isotropic nuclear grade graphite, IG-11. To measure the crack initiation point and the subsequent crack growth, the direct current potential drop (DCPD) method and a traveling microscope were used. The effects of test variables like initial crack length, specimen thickness, notch type and loading rate on the measured fracture toughness, KQ, were investigated. Based on the test results, the ranges of the test variables to measure the reliable fracture toughness value were proposed. During the crack growth, the rising R-curve behavior was observed in IG-11 graphite when the superficial crack length measured on the specimen surface was used. The increase of crack growth resistance was discussed in terms of crack bridging, crack meandering, crack branching, microcracking and crack deflection, which increase the surface energy and friction force.

In this study, corrosion fatigue test of SAPH45 steel was performed by the use of plane bending fatigue tester in marine environment and investigated fracture surface growth behavior of base metal and heat affected zone corrosion fatigue. The main results obtained are as follows: 1) Fracture surface growth of heat affected zone (HAZ) is delayed more than that of base matel (BM), and they tend to faster in seawater than in air. 2) Corrosion sensitivity to corrosion fatigue life of HAZ is more susceptible than that of BM. 3)In the case of the corner crack by corrosion fatigue, the correlation between the propagation rate of fracture surface area(dA/dN) and stress intensity factor range(ΔK) for SAPH45 are applied to Paris rule as follows: dA/dN=C(ΔK) super(m) where m is the slope of the correlation, and is about 6.60-6.95 in air and about 6.33-6.41 in seawater respectively.