Nuclear Waste High-Level Radioactive Waste (HLRW) High-level waste from nuclear power plants is the spent, or used, uranium fuel. Amount of used nuclear fuel generated per year presently stored at plants throughout the nation: 20 metric tons per year is generated by a typical plant; 2,000 metric tons is generated by the nuclear industry per year. The entire industry has produced about 40,000 metric tons of used nuclear fuel over the past four decades. If used fuel assemblies were stacked end-to-end and side-by-side, this would cover a football field about four yards deep. Low-Level Radioactive Waste (LLRW) Low-level waste consists of items that have come in contact with radioactive materials, such as gloves, personal protective clothing, tools, water purification filters and resins, plant hardware, and wastes from reactor cooling-water cleanup systems. It generally has levels of radioactivity that decay to background radioactivity levels in under 500 years. About 95 percent decays to background levels within 100 years or less. Amount of low-level radioactive waste generated per year by plant/industry: 1998 Average Reactor Volume - 742 cubic feet (21 cubic meters) for PWRs; 2,790 cubic feet (79 cubic meters) for BWRs 1998 Industry Volume - 135,394.71 cubic feet (3,834 cubic meters) The amount of low-level radioactive waste volume going to disposal facilities, such as Barnwell, has been reduced 96 percent since 1980. There is a downward trend in the volume of LLRW generated as well. As of June 2000, South Carolina will have received about $300 million, $235 per cubic feet, in taxes on low-level nuclear waste disposed of at Barnwell. LLRW disposal facilities: Barnwell, S.C. Hanford, Wash. Envirocare, Utah For more State and Compact information on LLRW, Link to: http://www.afton.com/llwforum