A Techno-Economic Assessment of Primary Heat Transport System Decontamination in Support of Decommissioning Pickering Nuclear Generating Station

Abstract

The operating reactor units at Pickering are expected to be permanently shut down between 2017 and 2020 and then decommissioned. OPG has adopted the 'Deferred Dismantling' strategy for decommissioning its nuclear plants. In contrast with prompt dismantling, radioactive decay leads to reduced dose expenditure during deferred dismantling. As part of the decommissioning strategy, chemical decontamination of the primary heat transport (PHT) system may be undertaken prior to Safe Storage. This involves the use of selected chemical reagents to dissolve the contaminated oxide present on PHT system surfaces. Decommissioning costs must be optimized by selecting the appropriate deferral period. The overall objective of the present work was to contribute to the optimization of the existing decommissioning plan by assessing the benefits of decontamination. Accordingly, an overall cost-benefit analysis for PHT system decontamination was performed. Details will be presented in this paper.