Accounting for engineered barrier saturation, steel container corrosion, hydrogen production and transfer within fractured rock in the assessments of low sorbing radionuclides release from geological disposal facilities

Abstract

The paper discusses the influence of bentonite saturation, package failure and water conductive fracture network on the transport of long-lived low sorbing radionuclides in geological disposal facilities (DGR). Based on the example of 129I, the study evaluates the influence of space and time dispersion of radionuclide transport and processes mentioned above on the long-term DGR safety. It demonstrates that these effects can cause significant radionuclide retention, nevertheless having minor impact on the long-term DGR safety as regards low sorbing nuclides with their half-lives amounting to over hundreds of thousand years. The paper also considers the opportunities for enhancing the GDF safety considering such radionuclides.