Compaction of crushed salt for safe containment: Overview of phase 2 of the KOMPASS project

Abstract

The KOMPASS project strives to improve the scientific basis behind using crushed salt for long-term isolation of high-level nuclear waste within rock salt repositories. Efforts to improve the prediction of crushed salt compaction began during the first phase of the KOMPASS project (KOMPASS-I, 2020). The second project phase (KOMPASS-II) just started in 2021. Its aim is foremost to quantify the effect of isolated experimental influencing factors on the compaction. Such influencing factors are for instance temperature, moisture or the chosen stress path. Used methods are laboratory tests, microstructural investigations and numerical simulations.