Closing the Book on the WVDP Vitrification Facility - 18222

Demolition of the West Valley Demonstration Project's Vitrification Facility was initiated on September 11, 2017, approximately 21 years after the facility produced its first canister of vitrified high-level waste. In the center of the structure, the heavily-reinforced concrete Vitrification Cell operated for six years, safely immobilizing about 24 million curies of high-level radioactive waste in borosilicate glass. When the facility was shut down in 2002, it had achieved the highest operational availability of any vitrification facility in the world. It was the first facility in the United States to complete its vitrification mission and is now the first in the nation to undergo demolition. This paper summarizes the selection, design, operation, deactivation and demolition of this facility. (authors)