Page 9 - SRS Overview Book 2021
P. 9

H Canyon


                                                SRS’ two primary separations facilities, called “canyons,” are located in F and
                                                H Areas. F Canyon and H Canyon—together with FB Line and HB Line, which
                                                are located atop the canyons—are where nuclear materials historically have
                                                been chemically recovered and purified. F Canyon and FB Line have been
                                                deactivated and await further disposition decisions.
           An operator                          HB Line historically performed Pu oxide production.
               (right)
        in the H Canyon                         H Canyon is the only operating production-scale, nuclear chemical separations
           (top) control
               room                             facility in the U.S. The facility’s operations originally recovered uranium-235
                                                and neptunium-237 from SNF rods from Site production reactors and from
                                                domestic and foreign research reactor programs.
                                                More recently, H Canyon has been processing SNF and, for the first time, is
                                                running three different uranium streams. This supports environmental cleanup
                                                and nuclear nonproliferation efforts, and a smaller, safer, more secure and
                                                less expensive nuclear weapons complex. The SNF, which can be used in
                                                nuclear weapons, is processed into low enriched uranium (LEU). LEU is not
                                                desirable for weapons use and can be used to make fuel for the Tennessee
                                                Valley Authority’s (TVA) commercial power reactors. Since March 2003, over
                                                330 trailers of LEU have been shipped to TVA, providing enough LEU to power
                                                all the homes in South Carolina for over 8.5 years or every home in the U.S.
                           (Clockwise from
                           left) A shipment     for approximately 47 days.
                           of low enriched
                           uranium on its
                           way to TVA;
                           Pu-238;              HB Line
                           an artist’s
                           rendering
                           of the Cassini       HB Line, located on top of H Canyon, is the only chemical processing facility of
                           spacecraft           its kind in the DOE complex.

                                                HB Line has produced Pu-238 for the National Aeronautics and Space
                                                Administration (NASA). In 1995, SRS completed a five-year campaign to supply
                                                Pu-238 for NASA’s Cassini mission. The unmanned expedition to Saturn was
                                                launched Oct. 13, 1997, and arrived on July 1, 2004. Cassini’s missions
                                                completed in 2018.
                                                HB Line has been used more recently to make Pu oxide,
                                                a non-weapons usable form of Pu, and is now in layup status.


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