Treatment, Conditioning and Packaging for Final Disposal of Low and Intermediate Level Waste From Cernavoda: A Techno-Economic Assessment

Abstract

National Nuclearelectrica Society (SNN) owns and operates two CANDU-6® plants at Cernavoda in Romania1. Two additional units are expected to be built on the site in the future.

Low and intermediate level short-lived radioactive wastes from Cernavoda are planned to be disposed off in a near-surface repository to be built at Saligny. The principal waste streams are IX resins, filters, compactable wastes, non-compactables, organic liquids and oil-solid mixtures. Their volumetric generation rates per reactor unit are estimated to be: IX resins (6 m³/y), filters (2 m³/y), compactables (23 m³/y) and non-compactables (15 m³/y).

A techno-economic assessment of the available options for a facility to treat and condition Cernavoda;s wastes for disposal was carried out in 2009 based on projected waste volumes from all four units. A large number of processes were first screened to identify viable options. They were further considered to develop overall processing options for each waste stream. These were then consolidated to obtain options for the entire plant by minimizing the number of unit operations required to process the various waste streams. A total of 9 plant options were developed for which detailed costing was undertaken. Based on a techno-economic assessment, two top ranking plant options were identified. Several scenarios were considered for implementing these options. Amongst them, a contractor run operation of a facility located on the Cernavoda site was considered to be more cost effective than operating the facility using SNN personnel.