• Journal of Nuclear Fuel Cycle and Waste Technology(JNFCWT)
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• v.15 no.4
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• pp.355-367
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• 2017

The decommissioning of Kori unit 1, which was permanently shut down in June of 2017, will be the first instance of the dismantling of a commercial nuclear power plant in Korea. The disposal of waste during the dismantling process accounts for a large part of the total decommissioning cost. Therefore, structures consisting of activated and contaminated concrete must be economically and safely dismantled by establishing a proper dismantling strategy. This study focuses on optimized dismantling and disposal scenarios pertaining to a biological shield. Several dismantling cases, regulations and technologies related to waste treatment as these practices pertain to nuclear power plants are analyzed. To minimize the amount of waste from the biological shield dismantling process, an optimized dismantling scenario is presented and disposal alternatives for dismantled concrete waste are proposed.

• Journal of Nuclear Fuel Cycle and Waste Technology(JNFCWT)
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• v.20 no.1
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• pp.99-110
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• 2022

In decommissioning a nuclear power plant, numerous concrete structures need to be demolished and decontaminated. Although concrete decontamination technologies have been developed globally, concrete cutting remains problematic due to the secondary waste production and dispersion risk from concrete scabbling. To minimize workers' radiation exposure and secondary waste in dismantling and decontaminating concrete structures, the following conceptual designs were developed. A micro-blast type scabbling technology using explosive materials and a multi-dimensional contamination measurement and artificial intelligence (AI) mapping technology capable of identifying the contamination status of concrete surfaces. Trials revealed that this technology has several merits, including nuclide identification of more than 5 nuclides, radioactivity measurement capability of 0.1-10⁷ Bq·g^-1, 1.5 kg robot weight for easy handling, 10 cm robot self-running capability, 100% detonator performance, decontamination factor (DF) of 100 and 8,000 cm²·hr^-1 decontamination speed, better than that of TWI (7,500 cm²·hr^-1). Hence, the micro-blast type scabbling technology is a suitable method for concrete decontamination. As the Korean explosives industry is well developed and robot and mapping systems are supported by government research and development, this scabbling technology can efficiently aid the Korean decommissioning industry.

• Journal of the Korean Recycled Construction Resources Institute
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• v.8 no.2
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• pp.167-174
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• 2020

Many researches have been conducted to utilize recycled aggregates in Korea, but since most sources of recycled aggregates are not clear, there is a lot of uncertainty in applying the existing research results on recycle of aggregates generated from nuclear power plants. In this study, therefore, in order to investigate the possibility of recycling coarse aggregates generated through dismantling of nuclear power plants in Korea, recycled coarse aggregates were produced from concrete simulating nuclear power plants in Korea. Using the recycled coarse aggregates, concrete was mixed in consideration of the mixing ratio of the recycled coarse aggregates, and the mechanical properties were experimentally investigated. From the test results, as the mixing ratio of recycled coarse aggregates increased. concrete compressive strength, tensile strength, and elastic modulus generally decreased up to 36, 37, and 27% from the mechanical properties of normal concrete, respectively. Therefore, it can be concluded that limitation on the mixing ratio of recycled coarse aggregates is necessary when coarse aggregates are recycled through dismantling of nuclear power plants.

• Journal of the Korea Institute of Building Construction
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• v.17 no.3
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• pp.269-277
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• 2017

In this work, as a preliminary experimental works, which focuses on utilizing separated pastes from activated (or radioactive) concrete as solidifying agents for radioactive waste immobilization, were performed. It was found that density of hydrated cement paste, which was lower than that of ordinary portland cement, increased as temperature for heat treatment increased. Highest compressive strength was observed with the specimens that was heat treated at $600^{\circ}C$. However, heat treatment over $700^{\circ}C$ showed higher CaO content that caused higher heat of hydration after in contact with water, lows of workability, and lower strength. Based on experimental results, it is suggested that $600^{\circ}C$ heat treatment is more appropriate for waste cement paste to be used as a solidifying agent.

• Journal of the Korean Recycled Construction Resources Institute
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• v.5 no.3
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• pp.223-229
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• 2017

When concrete is exposed to neutron rays for a long time, the concrete tends to become activated. If activated, it is classified as middle or low level radioactive waste. However, the great amount of the activated concrete is hard to dispose. In this study, low-activation cement was developed for decreasing the activated waste from shielding concrete around nuclear reactor. Furthermore, the manufactured low-activation was analyzed with activation nuclide Eu, Co. The low-activation cement showed great advantage for low-activation with detecting none of Eu and 3.75ppm of Co while ordinary portland cement showed 0.4~0.9ppm of Eu, 5.5~19.8ppm of Co content. As the results of physical properties of the low-activation cement, it is similar to type 1 ordinary portland cement and accords with type 4 low heat portland cement. Meanwhile, as for the chemical properties of the cement, it accords wite type 1 and 4 at the same time.