Disposal cover as an engineered barrier of a near-surface disposal facility for low and very low-level radioactive waste is composed of a multi-layer to isolate radioactive waste from environmental influences for the long term. To acquire a realistic forecast for the post-closure period of the disposal facility, it is essential to carry out long-term experimental research in a similar condition to the actual disposal environment. Hence, a performance test facility of the disposal cover was constructed in Gyeongju low and intermediate level radioactive waste disposal center in 2022. The constructed performance test facility has differences from the material properties presented in the design. These differences are factors that affect the prevent rainfall infiltration, which is one of the important roles of the disposal cover. Therefore, in this study, a numerical simulation of rainfall infiltration into the performance test facility was performed for the designed case and the actual constructed case. To simulate the behavior of water infiltration, the FEFLOW software based on the finite element method is used. Through the analysis of numerical simulation results, it is confirmed that the hydraulic conductivity of the material constituting the multi-layer of the disposal cover greatly influences the amount of water infiltration.

The organic complexing agents such as ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid (EDTA), nitrilotriacetic acid (NTA), and isosaccharinic acid (ISA) can enhance the radionuclides’ solubility and have the potential to induce the acceleration of radionuclides’ mobility to a far-field from the radioactive waste repository. Hence, it is essential to evaluate the effect of organic complexing agents on radionuclide solubility through experimental analysis under similar conditions to those at the radioactive waste disposal site. In this study, five radionuclides (cesium, cobalt, strontium, iodine, and uranium) and three organic complexing agents (EDTA, NTA, and ISA) were selected as model substances. To simulate environmental conditions, the groundwater was collected near the repository and applied for solubility experiments. The solubility experiments were carried out under various ranges of pHs (7, 9, 11, and 13), temperatures (10°C, 20°C, and 40°C), and concentrations of organic complexing agents (0, 10-5, 10-4, 10-3, and 10-2 M). Experimental results showed that the presence of organic complexing agents significantly increased the solubility of the radionuclides. Cobalt and strontium had high solubility enhancement factors, even at low concentrations of organic complexing agents. We also developed a support vector machine (SVM) model using some of the experimental data and validated it using the rest of the solubility data. The root mean square error (RMSE) in the training and validation sets was 0.012 and 0.016, respectively. The SVM model allowed us to estimate the solubility value under untested conditions (e.g., pH 12, temperature 30°C, ISA 5×10-4 M). Therefore, our experimental solubility data and the SVM model can be used to predict radionuclide solubility and solubility enhancement by organic complexing agents under various conditions.

Radioactive waste containing cellulosic materials such as cotton, paper and wood are being disposed in Low-and intermediate-level radioactive waste disposal site in Gyeongju. Cellulose has recently emerged great issue in terms of disposal site safety as it can be decomposed into an organic complex compound, ISA (isosaccharinic acid), under strong alkali conditions (pH 12.5 or higher) formed by the hydrated cement, to accelerate the mobility of the radionuclides in the disposal facility. However, in Korea, there are insufficient criteria for confirming the suitability for disposal of low-and intermediatelevel radioactive wastes including cellulose, and there is no specific method for evaluating the total amount of waste to confirm the suitability of disposal. Therefore, the method of SKB (Swedish Nuclear and Fuel Management Company), which has established acceptance criteria related to the physicalchemistry safety of cellulose, is analyzed to suggest a method for deriving the amount of cellulosecontaining waste disposal. Cellulose, an organic complexing agent, is an important consideration for safety case at the Swedish low-and intermediate-level radioactive waste disposal site SFR. SKB calculated the amount of cellulose generated by separately labeling cellulose-containing wastes of 1-2BMA, Silo and 1BTF (SKB 2013). BLA, a low-level radioactive waste disposal facility, is not considered due to its low radionuclide inventory (~0.2% of SFR’s total radionuclide inventory, SKB 2013). To calculate the amount of cellulose that can be disposed of, information on the mass and volume of hydrated cement (concrete waste, cement solidification waste, disposal container, grouting, disposal shed), the concentration of ISA absorbed in the hydrated cement, and the concentration of ISA dissolved in the groundwater which were used. In addition, the total disposable amount was calculated using the cellulose degradation rate, composition ratio, and the cellulose containing waste volume.

Cellulose-based wastes can be degraded into short-chain organic acids at the cementitious radioactive waste repository. Isosaccharinic acid (ISA), one of the main degradation products, can form the chelate complex with metals and radionuclides, and these complexes have a potential that can accelerate to move the radionuclides to far-field from the repository. This study characterized the amount of generated ISA from typical cellulosic materials in the repository. Two different degradation experiments were conducted under alkaline conditions (saturated with Ca(OH)2 at pH 12.4): i) cellulosic material mixture under an opened condition (partially aerobic), and ii) cellulosic material under an anaerobic condition in a nitrogen-purged glove box. In the first case, three different types of cellulosic materials–paper, cotton, and wood– were mixed at the same ratio, and the experiments were carried out at three different temperatures (20°C, 40°C, and 60°C). It revealed that both the cellulose degradation rate and generated ISA concentration were high at high reaction temperatures, and various soluble degradation products such as formic acid and lactic acid were generated. The cellulose degradation in this work seems to still stay at a peeling-off process. In the second study, each type of cellulosic material was applied in its own batch experiments, and the amount of generated ISA was in the order of paper > wood > cotton. The above two experiments are supposed to be a long-term study until the generated ISA reaches an equilibrium state.

The disposing method of the low-intermediate-level radioactive waste, near-surface disposal facilities are generally used. This disposal method refers to a method of constructing a concrete structure on the surface of the ground, putting radioactive waste in it, and covering it with an engineered barrier to isolate human life. Among these, engineered barriers mean covering multiple layers of heterogeneous materials such as sand, clay, and gravel. Engineering barriers have the purpose of delaying the release of radioactive materials into the natural environment as much as possible, and maintaining the isolation of radioactive waste and human life for as long as possible. In this study, the design and construction method of the facility to demonstrate the performance of the engineered barrier that isolates the surface disposal facility from nature was described. In addition, the design and construction method of monitoring technology that can monitor the safety of engineered barriers by measuring information such as moisture, temperature, and slope safety in real time was also explained.