• Proceedings of the Korean Radioactive Waste Society Conference
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• 2017.05a
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• pp.201-202
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• 2017

• Proceedings of the Korean Radioactive Waste Society Conference
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• 2017.05a
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• pp.245-246
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• 2017

• Proceedings of the Korean Radioactive Waste Society Conference
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• 2011.10a
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• pp.429-430
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• 2011

• Tunnel and Underground Space
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• v.29 no.4
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• pp.215-229
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• 2019

This technical note describes the current status of Finnish radioactive waste disposal project which started to construct the repository for spent nuclear waste for the first time in the world. Finland started operating nuclear power plant in 1977 and is currently operating four nuclear power plants. After detailed site surveys started in 1993, Olkiluoto was finally selected by the parliament of Finland as the site for geological disposal in 2001 followed by a construction license in 2015. If the operating license is approved by the government in the 2020s, it would be the world's first case of geological disposal. In ONKALO, a site-specific underground research facility at the site of Olkiluoto, various studies were conducted to verify the safety of the repository. Finland uses the KBS-3 disposal concept, and Korea considers a similar disposal concept because of similar rock formations. The entire process in Finland including the operation status of intermediate and low-level waste disposal, site investigation and selection stages, and the latest rock mechanics and hydrogeological studies in ONKALO are presented. Suggestions for the radioactive waste disposal in Korea is given based on the Finnish case.

• Resources Recycling
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• v.25 no.4
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• pp.23-31
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• 2016

It was found that there was no problem in recycling by-products (waste rock and tailings) from Yangyang iron mine themselves through matter conversion because they are not hazardous according to results of KSLT method. In case of using tailings as sub-materials of cement, it recommended the use of less than 3% tailings dosage not to exceed 0.6% of total alkali ($R_2O$) content based on standard quality of portland cement (KS L 5201). Non sintered eco-brick corresponding to class 1 quality of recycled clay brick (KS I 3013) can replace 15% of cement with tailings and 100% of general fine aggregate with waste rock from iron mine. As mentioned above, recycling the by-products (waste rock and tailings) as sub-materials of cement and non sintered eco-brick could gain both environmental and economic benefits, that is, reduction of scale and maintenance cost of tailing ponds, decrease of energy use and $CO_2$ emission.

• Economic and Environmental Geology
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• v.53 no.2
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• pp.133-145
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• 2020

Soil in mine waste-rock fields, and at the pithead, sediments and farmlands around an abandoned mine in the Chungcheong Province of South Korea were investigated to assess the distribution of metallic elements and to understand the scope of the pollution. Reddening was observed from the mine up to a distance of 61 m. Losses of waste rock around the mine were assessed over a section of 1800 ㎥. Yellowish precipitates on the bottom of a stream were identified as ferrihydrite and goethite. For anions, a mean sulfate ion level over 773.6 mg/L was found during August in the river water samples. Mine drainage at the site was shown to have a pH of 4.9 and a sulfate concentration of 1557.8 mg/L during the August rainy season. A possible cause of the metallic element contamination in the mine is waste-rock loss, because mine waste-rock is located on the slope in this area. In conclusion, the total soil area to be treated, based on the amount that exceeded the recommended Korean soil pollution levels, was assessed to be 10,297 ㎡.

• Tunnel and Underground Space
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• v.17 no.1 s.66
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• pp.43-55
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• 2007

An underground research tunnel, KURT, was constructed at Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute, for various in situ validation experiments related to the development of a high-level radioactive waste disposal system. KURT, which has length of 255 m (access tunnel 180 m and research modules 75 m) and size of $6m{\times}6m$ was excavated in a cryatalline rock mass. In the KURT project, different rock mechanics studies had been carried out during the concept design, site characterization, detailed design, and construction stages. From the geophysical survey, borehole investigation, and rock property tests in laboratory and in situ, the rock and rock mass properties required for the mechanicsl stability analysis of KURT could be achieved and used for the input parameters of computer simulations. In this paper, important results from the rock mechanics studies at KURT and the three-dimensional mechanical stability analysis will be introduced.

• Tunnel and Underground Space
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• v.12 no.3
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• pp.198-209
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• 2002

To assess deep geological environment for the research and development of hish-level radioactive waste disposal, six boreholes of 3" in diameter were installed in two granitic areas. An areal extent of the rock block scale in the study sites was estimated by the lineament analysis from satellite images and shaded relief maps. The characterization of fracture system developed in rock block scale was carried out based on the acoustic televiewer logging in deep boreholes. In the Yuseong site, the granite rock mass was divided into the upper and lower zones at around -160m based on the probabilistic distribution characteristics of the geometric parameters such as orientation, fracture frequency, spacing and aperture size. Since the groundwater flow is dependent on the fracture system in a fractured rock mass, the correlation of the fracture frequency and cumulative aperture size to the hydraulic conductivity was also discussed.

• Tunnel and Underground Space
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• v.8 no.1
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• pp.1-7
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• 1998

In order to get the information of the deformational behavior of rock masses with time in waste disposal repository, it is necessary to measure the relationships between stress and strain and time for temperature. A creep law is used in conjunction with the elastic moduli to calculate stress and displacement following waste emplacement. Exponential-time law's parameters consist of stress and temperature. In this study, thermal creep test was carried out for Whangdeung granite. The measured creep deformation behavior was well explained by exponential time law and generalized Kelvin's rheological model. Mechanicla coefficients for exponential-time creep law showed the clear tendency of temperature dependent while those for Kelvein's model didn't.

• Computational Structural Engineering
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• v.8 no.4
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• pp.107-115
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• 1995

The long term behavior of the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant(WIPP), a nuclear waste repository currently under construction near Carlsbad at New Mexico, depends upon the fracture and deformation behavior of bedded rock salt. Although many numerical analyses of the WIPP have been conducted, to our knowledge none have included the ability to simultaneously predict the effects of fracture and nonlinear deformation of the salt continuum. We are in the process of developing a finite element program to simulate the effects of nonlinear fracture mechanics and nonlinear continuum behavior of rock salt simultaneously.