Decommissioning of Russian research facilities

When the most of our research facilities were built and put in operation more than 30 years ago there had been neither requirements no regulations concerning their future decommissioning (D and D). And due to that fact nobody thought of that in the initial designs of these facilities. The situation changed when in 1994 a top-level safety standard 'Safety Provision for Safety of Research Reactors' was issued by Gosatomnadzor of Russia with a special chapter 7, devoted to D and D issues. Unfortunately, it was just one page of requirements pertaining RR D and D in general terms and was not specific. Only in 2001 Gosatomnadzor of Russia developed and issued a more specific standard 'Rules for Safety Decommissioning of Nuclear Research Facilities'. From the total number of 85 Nuclear Research Facilities, including 34 research reactors, 36 critical assemblies and 15 subcritical assemblies, we have now 7 facilities under decommissioning. The situation is inevitably changing over the time. In the end of 2003 the decision was made to permanently shutdown two RR: AM, graphite type with channels, 15 MBt; BR-10, LMFR type, 10 MBt, and to start preparatory work for their future decommissioning, starting from 2005. It needs to be mentioned that from this list we have 6 reactors with which we face many difficulties in developing decommissioning technologies, namely: for TVR reactor: handling of heavy water and high radiation field in the core; for MR reactor: very complex reactor with many former radioactive spills, which is required a careful and expensive D and D work; AM: graphite utilization problem; BR-10: a problem of coolant poisoned with other heavy metals (like lead, bismuth); IBR-30: the fuel cannot be removed from the core prior the D and D project starts; RG-1M: location is above Arctic Circle, problem of transfer of irradiated parts of the reactor. The decision was made to bury then on the site thus creating a shallow-land radwaste storage facility. The established D and D standard explains in more or less detail the procedures to be accomplished before the actual decommissioning process can start. Basically these are: remove fuel from the reactor core to an interim SF storage facility at the reactor; after specified time of cooling, remove the fuel from the reactor building; drain coolant by using operational manual and remove it from the reactor building; conduct Engineering and Radiation Monitoring of the facility to get initial data on radiation conditions; Develop a Principal D and D Programme; develop a D and D documentation; develop a D and D SAR. Only after these procedures and documents have been accomplished and prepared an operating organization may apply for a D and D license to be issued by Gosatomnadzor of Russia. When a D and D project is fully accomplished by an operating organization the final results/conditions at the former RR site shall be evidenced by a special commission, including a Gosatomnadzor of Russia representative. A Final Report on D and D with the radiation data achieved in the end of its implementation shall be written and submitted to Gosatomnadzor of Russia for review and making decision on taking a research facility out of regulatory control