Important parameters in ORIGEN2 calculations of spent fuel compositions

The Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Civilian Radioactive Waste Management (OCRWM) is responsible for implementing federal policy for the management and permanent disposal of spent nuclear fuel from civilian nuclear power reactors and of high-level radioactive waste. The Characteristics Data Base (CDB) provides an extensive collection of data on the four waste steams that may require long-term isolation: LWR spent fuel, high-level waste, non-LWR spent fuel, and miscellaneous wastes (such as greater-than-class-C). The eight-volume report and the five supplemental menu-driven PC data bases encompass radiological characteristics, chemical compositions, physical descriptions, inventories, and projections. An overview of these data bases, which are available through the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, is provided by Notz. This paper reports that the radiological characteristics in the CDB are calculated using ORIGEN2