 Implications of the new National Energy Basic Plan for nuclear waste management in KoreaWon Il Ko and Eun-ha Kwon Energy Policy, 2009, vol. 37, issue 9, 3484-3488 Abstract: The Korean National Energy Committee has recently adopted a new National Energy Basic Plan according to which the electricity generated by nuclear power plants is to increase from the current 35.5% of total electricity production to 59% by 2030. This large increase in nuclear power will inevitably accelerate the accumulation of spent fuel; if the direct disposal option is pursued, spent fuel arisings in Korea are expected to exceed 100,000Â tHM in 2100. It is estimated that the country will require between 10-22 disposal sites, each with an area equal to the Gyeongju low- and intermediate-level radioactive waste (LILW) disposal site, to accommodate this amount of spent fuel. However, considering Korea's geographic profile, securing this number of sites will be almost impossible, and will ultimately create a serious problem for the sustainability of nuclear energy in the country. In view of this dilemma, this paper recommends that the volume of Korean nuclear waste for disposal be significantly reduced, and offers sodium fast reactor (SFR)-based recycling as a potentially viable solution. Keywords: Nuclear; policy; Spent; fuel; Underground; repository (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:enepol:v:37:y:2009:i:9:p:3484-3488 Access Statistics for this article Energy Policy is currently edited by N. France More articles in Energy Policy from Elsevier |
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