Australia to get high level nuclear wastes from UK, in return for Lucas Heights nuclear waste sent to UK

Kazzi Jai No Nuclear Waste Dump Anywhere in South Australia, 1 Dec 19,

This is a quote taken from Hef Griffiths in June 2018 for National Radioactive Waste Management Facility (NRWMF) ….”The reprocessed waste is based on equivalence and what is returned is the same total radioactivity by isotope of waste that you have sent over, bar what would have decayed during the time overseas. Companies wouldn’t process just the small amount of waste that a country like Australia would generate. What is agreed is what we are going to send, what is going to be extracted and what is going to get sent back.

Australia sent some waste in the early 90s to Dounreay in Scotland and it would have come back in cement drums which would have been difficult to manage. In 2013 Australia was offered a substitution agreement.

This offered us the chance to substitute the cemented waste from Dounreay of an equivalent activity of waste in vitrified form from the Sellafield facility. It meant that we were getting 4 vitrified canisters rather than 52 concrete drums. Ultimately it will allow us to have a lot more cost effective disposal.”

We then have a Joint Committee report in 2017 which you can find on the ARPANSA website which states ”As stated in the 2014 report, ANSTO and the UK Nuclear Decommissioning Authority enacted a substitution agreement in 2013, under which ANSTO gave up title to the reprocessed residues from the reprocessing of 114 SFEs at Dounreay.

Instead, ANSTO agreed to take a radioactive equivalent to the Dounreay waste in the form of four canisters of CSD-V vitrified material currently held at Sellafield. Planning for the return of this material is underway. An agreement for the supply of a second TN-81 container has been enacted with AREVA TNI, and negotiations for the eventual removal from storage and transportation of the canisters are underway with the UK. It is anticipated that the shipment to Australia will occur in or after late 2020,resulting in the full disposition of spent fuel from the HIFAR reactor.”

Soooooo….The next question is….these canisters are CSD-V……

According to La Hague in France…..

”A high level glass-ceramic for the vitrification of legacy, highly-corrosive UMo fission products (from recycled GCR fuel). These are known as CSD-U canisters.

A high level borosilicate glass for the vitrification of UOX fission products (fission product solutions derived from the processing of LWR fuel), with a high throughput (the capacity of the vitrification line is doubled by retrofitting a CCIM). These are known as CSD-V canisters.”

So….what are we getting back from Sellafield again….you have it ….CSD-V!!

And…..From an Assessment Report tabled by ANSTO for Interim Waste Store Safety Assessment 2014… ”The analysis is bounded by the thermal power of the CSD-V (i.e. vitrified waste from HLW) which generates about 3.7 times more heat than CSD-U.”

Just as well the TN-81 casks have cooling fins!!

December 2, 2019 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | AUSTRALIA - NATIONAL, Federal nuclear waste dump

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