Project Operations
Repository Design

Repository Design creates the blueprints or drawings used to build the different parts of the repository, and ensures that each operates properly. All the parts must work correctly as separate units and as part of a total repository system.

The experts who do this work are architects, draftsmen, planners, and engineers -- civil, mechanical, electrical, fire protection, and human-factors. They integrate the technical requirements, knowledge of the area's natural properties, and the legal restrictions to produce a safe system. As a result, Repository Design works closely with Repository Operations and Environmental Studies in understanding all the federal and local rules that apply. The group also interacts with Engineered Barrier System and Radiological Safety.

Designing the repository is an evolutionary process -- one that begins with a general idea, or concept, of how the repository might look and operate. As teams of scientists and engineers gather and review information, more detail is added to the drawings.

As the drawings become more specific, Repository Design scrutinizes every aspect. The evolving design -- as a seamless system and as a combination of separate parts -- is evaluated for performance, structural soundness, safety, cost, and long-term management.

Repository Design considers every part of the repository -- from preparing the site with power, water, and telephone services, to building off-loading docks and warehouses. They plan for digging the small tunnels that hold the waste packages and even influence how these packages are built. They also specify how to close the site and prepare designs for backfilling tunnels and boreholes.

This group anticipates problems that might happen when the parts of the repository work with one another. They use computer-generated simulations and small-scale models to help visualize this interaction and show how equipment operates. The process is methodical -- with the staff's identifying, and then resolving, each potential problem.

Repository Design meets frequently with other groups to review and explain the status of designs and answer questions. These groups include the U.S. Department of Energy, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board, and the state of Nevada, as well as the public.

Repository Design brings together the work of many different Project groups. Their ability to take general ideas and develop detailed blueprints for operation is critical to building a repository that works as predicted.

Additional Information:
Why Yucca Mountain?	History of nuclear waste program
Who's watching us?	Project Fact Sheets
Project Operations	Transportation
Project Databases	Employment Opportunities

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