Management of Radioactive Wastes in Europe (EC) History, Philosophy and Plans for the Next Five Years
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by Elsevier Science Publishing Company, BASIS FOR NUCLEAR WASTE MANAGEMENT
Inc.
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Stephen V. Topp, editor
MANAGEMENT OF RADIOACTIVE WASTES IN EUROPE (EC) FOR THE NEXT FIVE YEARS
S. ORLOWSKI AND R.A SIMON Commission of the European Communities, Belgium
HISTORY,
PHILOSOPHY AND PLANS
200 rue de la Loi,
B-1049 Brussels,
ABSTRACT Since its first R & D programme on radioactive waste management in 1973, the European Community has been contributing a steadily increasing share of the European research effort in this field. A major part of the programme is devoted to the investigation and evaluation of management concepts for high-level and TRU wastes from the backend of the fuel cycle. Risk analysis studies for the assessment of multi-barrier terminal isolation systems currently have high priority.
INTRODUCTION The European Community, i.e. Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Greece,Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom, has only very limited domestic energy resources and depends heavily upon imported oil. It has therefore, as early as 1958, sought to diversify its energy sources by promoting nuclear energy as a complement to its modest domestic reserves of fossile fuels. The present aim is to increase the share of coal and nuclear energy in electricity generation from about 55% today to 75% in 1990. As the Community's own uranium resources are insufficient to satisfy such a large electricity generating programme beyond the year 2000, the Council of Ministers confirmed in February 1980, that continuation of fuel reprocessing and the development of the FBR are in the best interests of the Community, with a view to keeping these options open. Our activities in the field of radioactive waste management are therefore based on a closed nuclear fuel cycle with U and Pu recycle. HISTORIC MILESTONES OF WASTE MANAGEMENT The discovery of radioactivity in the late 19th century by Becquerel and the Curies was made possible by treatment of what since then has been called "radioactive wastes". In 1898, the Curies processed tons of pitchblend tailings to extract Radium and Polonium and in 1903 received the Nobel prize for this original feat of handling radioactive waste. Disposal of (non high-level) wastes from the nuclear Research Centres and early reactors began in 1951 with sea-dumping operations of medium level wastes and shallow land burial of low level wastes. At the same time, interim storage on the sites of some facilities continued. From 1967 until 1977 sea-disposal operations were carried out under the auspices of the OECD, who also issued guidelines for the packaging and the selection of the dumping site. In 1979, the overall responsibility for these operations returned to the participating countries under the London Convention.
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During the late fifties the reprocessing plants at Windscale (1952) and Marcoule began to handle the Uranium metal fuel from the gas- graphite power industrial This led to the first reactors (Calder Hall 1956, Marcoule 1958). processes for treatment and sto
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