Technical aspects regarding the management of radioactive waste resulting from decommissioning of nuclear facilities

Full text: The treatment and conditioning of non-fuel-cycle radioactive waste started at STDR nearly 26 years ago, and disposal activities started at DNDR 16 years ago. Both facilities were designed and built according to the philosophy of '60s and '70s, common to ex socialist countries, excepting for some West-European imports. Concerning the radioactive waste management resources at IFIN-HH , a 'Technical analysis of STDR', was completed by CITON (a nuclear design company) in December 1997, in order to face future needs and reactor decommissioning. This includes a technical analysis of the present status of STDR systems and suggestions for both refurbishing of the existing installation for treating, decontamination and conditioning of reactor decommissioning wastes, with the objective of meeting state-of-the art techniques and international recommendations. Decommissioning of the Magurele research reactor will create additional waste streams for a short period, which will be treated in the Waste Treatment Plant. Taking into consideration all the aspects occurred it is obvious that before starting the decommissioning programme is necessary to up-grade the waste management facilities. In this respect, simultaneously with the development of the decommissioning project studies on up-grading the waste management facilities were started, in order to be able to collect, treat, condition and finally dispose the resulted wastes. Another major issue is the management of wastes such aluminium, graphite and long life spent sources, which require special technologies and must be kept in special storage until the proper solution will be find. (author)