We thank the USNRC for their assiduous review and certification of the HI-STAR 100MB transport package (Docket # 71-9378) which, given its versatility and fungibility, is destined to become America’s workhorse for transporting used nuclear fuel. We expect this cask to be employed to transport used fuel of all different sizes and lengths from the nuclear plant sites around the country to our consolidated interim storage facility, HI-STORE CIS (under licensing) in southeastern New Mexico, or directly to a repository.
Among the technology differentiators of HI-STAR 100MB (please see a pictorial view on this page) are its ability to ship contents packaged in an MPC or in a “bare basket,” to transport both moderate burn-up and high burn-up fuel in the various sizes employed in light water reactors, and to transport fuel with as little as 3 ½ years of decay after discharge from the reactor.
The certification of HI-STAR 100MB at present includes the high capacity Canister, MPC-32M, and “bare baskets” F-24M and F-32M, all using Metamic-HT as basket material for optimal performance. The cask is however sized to hold any canister loaded in the industry up to 68-1/2 inches in diameter which means almost every canister commissioned into dry storage in the US before 2014.
A dual purpose (capable of transport and on-site storage) and dual use (capable of holding both unpackaged and canisterized fuel) makes HI-STAR 100MB industry’s first cask of the “double dual” genre accruing utmost versatility to the user.
HI-STAR 100MB utilizes a number of Holtec-owned patents, such as the “collapsible trunnions,“ to achieve its superb structural, thermal and shielding capabilities. Together with its larger cousin, the HI-STAR 190 universal cask (sized to transport the extra-large Canisters deployed in the past five years, and some large legacy canisters), HI-STAR 100MB will provide the means to safely transport all of America’s fuel from the nation’s nuclear plants. We also expect HI- STAR100MB to elicit a strong demand from our overseas clients.
“Developing ever more robust transport casks with ever more versatility to make fuel transport on our nation’s railroads ever safer is a core mission of our Nuclear Power Division. HI-STAR 100MB exemplifies our new generation of transport casks that fulfill the above mission in full measure,” says Dr. Stefan Anton, Holtec’s VP of Engineering & Licensing.
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