2009 Report to Government on National Research and

purchase of equipment. In addition, the potential user community is confused
about the process and terms of access <strong>to</strong> NNL active facilities (CoRWM doc.
2630).
Other Facilities
5.13 There are a number of supply chain organisations that have some capacity <strong>to</strong>
work with radioactive materials. These include AMEC, which operates the NIRAS
facility, Serco and Waste Management Technology. Most of these facilities can
only handle low levels of activity. For example, most of the NIRAS facility is
geared <strong>to</strong>wards environmental radioactivity and it can only accommodate
experiments with the less active ILW. The MoD also has some facilities, for
example on the Aldermas<strong>to</strong>n site.
International Examples of Active Facilities
5.14 Several countries, particularly the major nuclear nations, have R&D facilities <strong>to</strong>
support civil and/or military programmes. However, direct comparisons of UK
facilities with those overseas are not straightforward. There are substantial
differences in national requirements, depending largely on whether or not fuel
has been reprocessed on an industrial scale, while some labora<strong>to</strong>ries incorporate
nuclear research in<strong>to</strong> a more general energy programme, and some support both
civil and military programmes. Nevertheless, it is possible and instructive <strong>to</strong>
identify a few illustrative examples for comparison.
France
5.15 France operates a nuclear fuel cycle that includes reprocessing of irradiated fuel
and recycling of plu<strong>to</strong>nium in mixed oxide fuel (MOX), and has done so for some
decades. In France, much R&D is conducted by CEA, which has responsibilities
in both civil and military nuclear energy. This includes decommissioning and
some aspects of waste disposal, <strong>to</strong>gether with new reac<strong>to</strong>rs, nuclear fusion and
novel waste management technologies such as partitioning and transmutation
(para. 3.14).
5.16 The focus of R&D on radioactive waste in CEA is Marcoule, and particularly the
recently (2003) completed Atalante facility. 20 In many ways, this is a close
parallel <strong>to</strong> the Central Labora<strong>to</strong>ry of the UK NNL (para 5.7). Marcoule is a longestablished
site, with both old and current facilities, and Atalante is a purposebuilt
R&D facility on that site. Atalante has 19,000 m 2 of labora<strong>to</strong>ries, including 17
glovebox-equipped labora<strong>to</strong>ries and seven sets of shielded hot cells and remote
manipula<strong>to</strong>rs. Some other specialist facilities have also been developed by, or
with the involvement of, the CEA, for example, the Soleil synchrotron built at
Saclay, and the dedicated radioactive materials beamline (MARS) on Soleil.
Recent and planned CEA active facilities include the Phénix fast neutron
radiation source, which was taken off-line in March <strong>2009</strong>, the pro<strong>to</strong>type sodium
fast reac<strong>to</strong>r ASTRID (which can be used <strong>to</strong> produce plu<strong>to</strong>nium, americium and
other actinides) that is planned <strong>to</strong> be operational by 2020, and the Jules Horowitz
reac<strong>to</strong>r that will provide irradiated materials by 2015.
20 http://www-marcoule.cea.fr
CoRWM Document 2543, Oc<strong>to</strong>ber <strong>2009</strong> Page 81 of 151