In august 2000, the Commercial Society S.C. Forever SRL who is the owner of furnaces 3 and 4, started to decommission furnaces 3 and 4, and finalized the decommissioning of furnace no. 3 in June 2001. All this activities were made without Regulatory authorization. The debris remained in the perimeter (on-site) of Forever SRL. The furnace no. 3 contained in the perimeter wall 38 small radioactive sources Co-60+Ag-110m installed in 1985, with initial activities between 10-200 mCi. Also, the furnace no. 4 contains in the perimeter wall 32 small radioactive sources Co-60+Ag-110m installed in 1985, with initial activities between 10-500 mCi. The dismantling of furnace no. 4 has been stopped in 2001 through Regulatory Body intervention. The measurement performed on-site by Regulatory Body inspection team found gamma radiation fields 0.5-430 uSv/h, with a maximum 4mSv/h at surface of some debris bricks. The spectrometry analyses showed the presence of gamma radiation generated by Co-60. Due to short half-life, Ag-110m completely desintegrated. No workers contamination and health effects investigations have been found. The restricted area was set up around contaminated area contained debris and furnace no.4. Also the Police Departament was informed about this, in order to perform criminal rerearch. The Romanian Regulatory Authority dispose transportation only the part of debris which is radioactive at Radioactve Waste Treatment Station of IFIN-HH (Nuclear Physics Research Institute). The decommissioning and transport shall be made by firms authorized and qualified by Romanian Regulatory Authority.
A vast subsea nuclear graveyard planned to hold Britain’s burgeoning piles of radioactive waste is set to become the biggest, longest-lasting and most expensive infrastructure project ever undertaken in the UK. The project [UK's nuclear waste dump] is now predicted to take more than 150yrs to complete with lifetime costs of £66bn in today’s money...The […]
Last year, the Dutch Province of Limburg started an alliance in which, besides the local government, research institutes, small nuclear reactor (SMR) developers, utilities, industrial customers and funders cooperated. With this "Limburg SMR alliance" Limburg tried to lead the way towards an SMR in Limburg. The preferred site for a first SMR would be Chemelot, […]
From the IPFM: During a visit to the Civaux nuclear power plant on 18 March 2024, France's Minister of the Armed Forces unveiled a plan to use the plant to produce tritium for the French nuclear weapons program. Civaux is a civilian power plant that belongs to and is operated by Electricité de France. According […]
An analysis by the Norwegian NGO Bellona of transborder trade operations with the customs code 840130 (irradiated fuel assemblies or fuel elements) show a more than twofold increase of import to EU countries of fresh nuclear fuel in cash terms – from 280 million Euros in 2022 to 686 million Euros in 2023. In physical […]
The French government has said it is "seriously" studying the option of building a plant to convert and enrich reprocessed uranium to cut its reliance on Russia following the invasion of Ukraine. The only plant in the world that currently converts reprocessed uranium for use in nuclear power plants is in Russia. "The option of […]