Flexible Packaging and Real Time Assay Techniques to Divert Low Activity Waste LLW from the UK LLWR - 18011
- Nuvia Limited (United Kingdom)
- PacTec EPS Ltd (United Kingdom)
- PacTec Inc (United Kingdom)
- Augean PLC (United Kingdom)
- Magnox Ltd (United Kingdom)
Historically, all Low Level Waste (LLW) produced in the UK was sent to the Low Level Waste Repository (LLWR) near Drigg in Cumbria in mild steel IP2 containers. However, this single national asset is filling up very quickly and the UK national LLW policy is to divert waste to alternative sites wherever possible. This paper will describe how through a collaboration between Magnox Ltd, NUVIA Limited, Pactec EPS and Augean Plc has allowed for low activity LLW (<200 MBq/Tonne) to be packaged into IP1 flexible bags, assayed within the flexible packages and then consigned to a suitably designed and licensed landfill site. The Magnox site at Harwell in Oxfordshire is in the process of total decommissioning. A project was initiated to explore the viability of utilising the PACTEC LIFTPAC{sup R} IP1 flexible packages which can contain 1 m{sup 3} of waste and assaying the waste using the NUVIA Limited transportable High Resolution Assay Monitor (HiRAM) before sending the waste for disposal at the Augean Plc East Northants Resource Management Facility (ENRMF) in Cambridgeshire. The project led to a fundamental change in the culture of LLW disposal and the paper will explore the commonly held misconception that flexible packaging can only be used for the transportation and disposal of Very Low Level Waste (VLLW). It will also explore how the NUVIA Limited HiRAM system can assay large quantities of these bags in a short time period to a high level of accuracy such that they were able to consign the waste for disposal to ENRMF. This technique and disposal route is open and available to many other waste producers both within the UK and beyond and has proven cost savings to the waste producer. (authors)
- Research Organization:
- WM Symposia, Inc., PO Box 27646, 85285-7646 Tempe, AZ (United States)
- OSTI ID:
- 22975247
- Report Number(s):
- INIS-US--20-WM-18011
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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