Transportation of spent PWR and BWR fuels

[RuthWeiner@AOL.COM]

Dear Mr. Lochbaum:


One of your admirers, Mr. Norman Cohen, transmitted a question from me about spent fuel transportation for your response.  Since your response had nothing to do with spent fuel transportation, it is possible that something was lost in transmission.  Therefore, I am posing the questions I posed to Mr. Cohen directly to you.  By way of background, Mr. Cohen rather casually said in a post to RADSAFE that what he really feared was transportation of spent fuel.  Since I work in this area, I would like to know the specifics of what is behind those fears.


Here are the questions, quoted directly from my post to RADSAFE for Mr. Cohen  (the "you" I am addressing is Mr. Cohen):


1.  Why do you call SNF transportation "Mobile Chernobyl"?  What is it about that transportation that makes it comparable to the Chernobyl accident, in your eyes?  Do you refer to an automobile engine as "mobile napalm"?  Where is the fallacy in my previous response that an uncontrolled criticality couldn't occur in a SNF transportation cask in an accident?


2. [Mr. Cohen stated his group was concerned about accidents and I didn't seem to be concerned because I thought the casks were, in his words, "strong enough"]  


My response contains the questions I would like your response to:


You [ Mr. Cohen] are quite wrong: it is precisely because we are concerned that the casks are designed as they are and that the risks and consequences of accidents are so consistently overestimated in every analysis.  But to my question: Don't you think the casks are "strong enough"?  What kind of accident do you think they are not strong enough to withstand?  Is there any accident that you think they ARE strong enough to withstand?  Do you think 10 CFR Part 71 Subpart E is just whistling in the wind?  Not enforced?  Disregarded?  Inadequate?  If you think it is inadequate, in what way do you think so?


Quite sincerely, I would appreciate your response at your convenience.  



Ruth Weiner, Ph. D.

ruthweiner@aol.com