France [Experiences from international projects on the decommissioning of both large and small facilities]. Annex II

A separate subdivision of the Commissariat à l'energie atomique et aux energies alternatives (CEA) for radiopharmaceutical production named ORIS was formed within the CEA in the 1950s. Three shielded cells were used for production of ¹³⁷Ce and ⁹⁰Sr sources for medical purposes. This was stopped in 1972, the cells were taken out of service in 1973, and remained in disuse until 1987, when a first cleaning campaign was launched for a few months. Decommissioning work started in 1990 and reached the total dismantling stage in 1994. These activities are illustrated. As the plant was quite old, plans were not necessarily perfectly up to date (as-built), and the engineers in charge of the dismantling did not have information on what happened when the cells were in use. Operating reports were not available, and reliable records were missing. The details were not all documented, so sometimes contamination was found in places where there should not have been any. Moreover, objects were discovered that were not assembled as indicated on the plans