Solid Radioactive Waste Strategy Report.pdf - UK EPR

EPR UK
N° NESH-G/2008/en/0123
REV. A PAGE 57 / 257
It is intended that this strategy will incorporate effective, tried and tested waste management
options. The options above seek to take a broad view of feasible treatment and conditioning
techniques as required to inform a robust waste management strategy.
In accordance with good waste minimisation practice, waste arising from the operation of the
UK EPR will be segregated at source on the basis of its activity and its physical and chemical
characteristics. Waste with a high liquid content, for example solid wastes arising from the
treatment of liquid waste, will be dewatered. This process reduces the mass of the waste and
the mobility of the radionuclides contained within the waste and facilitates downstream
conditioning of the waste.
All nuclear material will be retained on-site until it has been appropriately conditioned and
packaged or declared as exempt from regulatory control.
LLW will be conditioned in accordance with the conditions for acceptance for the selected
disposal route [Ref. 33] and transferred off-site. Only ILW will be stored on site for extended
periods until such a time as the GDF becomes available. Any ILW produced will be processed
and packaged in accordance with the methods agreed in the Letter of Compliance issued by
RWMD. This will ensure, so far as is practicable that the waste is suitable for eventual disposal
in a GDF and can be stored in a passively safe state on-site in the interim time period. During
the timescale for disposal of ILW to a disposal facility it is possible that some wastes may decay
below the ILW threshold limits. Although initially stored as ILW these waste streams will be recategorised,
removed from the waste store and shipped as LLW.
Within the timeframe for final disposal of ILW there may be significant developments in
treatment and conditioning processes. For example, advanced treatment and conditioning
processes such as separation, transmutation and immobilisation of actinides and fission
products which are currently at an early stage of development may become available within this
time frame. Therefore, waste forms that provide the option for such advanced conditioning in
the future whilst permitting safe interim storage may become the preferred option. Care is
therefore required to ensure that the current selected treatment and conditioning options do not
preclude future processing. An example of a situation where this could occur is in wastes
arising from the treatment of EPR waste liquid (evaporator concentrates, resins). Early
encapsulation of these materials would not only increase storage and disposal volumes but
could also hinder future waste conditioning. Therefore de-watering of residues has been
selected as the preferred approach (e.g. dewatering of resins, in-drum drying of evaporator
concentrates) as this technique has been proven in other countries and minimises the volume of
waste generated, whilst facilitating future waste conditioning [Ref. 34 and Ref. 35].