Management of Metals from Decommissioning of Nuclear Facilities - 18411

Conference · Sun Jul 01 04:00:00 EDT 2018

OSTI ID:22977709

Larsson, Arne; Lindberg, Maria ^[1]; Beckwith, Karen ^[2]; Buttin, Jeremy ^[3]

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1. Cyclife Sweden AB (Sweden)
2. Cyclife UK (United Kingdom)
3. Electricite de France - EDF (France)

The EDF group companies within the Cyclife platform have for decades performed treatment and recycling of metals. With different approaches but all considered international Good Practice, as valuable materials are recovered for safe recycling and volumes in the repositories for radioactive waste are saved. For an efficient decommissioning project, a well-defined waste management process is one of the critical paths, not least when it comes to routes for clearance and recycling of materials. It is easy to underestimate the complexity and bottlenecks caused by shortage of logistic space. In order to mitigate these risks, activities such as strengthening categorization, quantification and adopting different routes based on the material properties should be implemented. By categorization of the of waste and materials considered/classified as contaminated or potentially contaminated it is obvious that the management of the metals is a key parameter in nuclear decommissioning. Analyses performed by the EDF companies shows that a majority of the materials, classified as contaminated, from a BWR/PWR plant are metals. Experience gives that a high percentage of these metals from decommissioning can be subject to recycling either directly upon completion of the clearance process or after certain treatment. Non-technical key parameters like the regulatory requirements on applying the waste hierarchy, the impact on repository programs as well as, not at least, the regulatory and public acceptance of recycling of materials from the nuclear industry are, together with costs essential factors when forming the routing of metals and other waste materials from a decommissioning project. Today the EDF group companies are positioned to provide a wide range of services for management of the contaminated metals from decommissioning projects, spanning from industrial management of metals which directly will be subject general clearance after verification measurements up to decontamination and melting of selected reactor internals for recycling to public domain or within the nuclear industry. In this paper the typical waste material composition for BWR and PWR plants, the different ways to treat/manage the radioactive and potentially radioactive metals including a comparison of the different approach commonly used in a technical, logistical and economical perspectives. A few success stories will be resented as well as lessons learned. (authors)

• Research Organization: WM Symposia, Inc., PO Box 27646, 85285-7646 Tempe, AZ (United States)
• OSTI ID: 22977709
• Report Number(s): INIS-US--20-WM-18411
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

12 MANAGEMENT OF RADIOACTIVE AND NON-RADIOACTIVE WASTES FROM NUCLEAR FACILITIES
BWR TYPE REACTORS
CONTAMINATION
DECOMMISSIONING
DECONTAMINATION
HEALTH HAZARDS
MATERIALS RECOVERY
MITIGATION
NUCLEAR FACILITIES
NUCLEAR INDUSTRY
OCCUPATIONAL SAFETY
PLANNING
PWR TYPE REACTORS
RADIATION PROTECTION
RADIOACTIVE WASTE DISPOSAL
RADIOACTIVE WASTE STORAGE
RADIOACTIVE WASTES
RECYCLING
SCRAP METALS