Old waste products - new requirements. Preparations for the later repository

For more than 30 years now, the Hauptabteilung Dekontaminationsbetriebe (HDB, Central Decontamination Department) of the Forschungszentrum Karlsruhe has been engaged in the management of radioactive wastes produced by the operation and decommissioning of research reactors and institutes of the Research Center, the Karlsruhe reprocessing plant, the European Institute for Transuranium Elements, and the Baden-Wuerttemberg state collection center. For this purpose, the wastes delivered to HDB have been conditioned at various facilities according to the requirements specified. These conditioning requirements, however, have changed in the course of time. In the past, only minimum declaration and conditioning requirements had to be fulfilled for the ASSE repository storage facility. Since 1994, the KONRAD repository storage conditions have been adopted. They comprise a variety of quality criteria. Judging from today, duration of interim storage until transfer to a repository storage facility will take another 30 years at least. In addition to the documentary qualification of the waste products, it is therefore required to take measures to ensure long-term safety of both the waste packages and their storage. This is why the HDB, in agreement with the supervisory authority, i.e. the Federal Radiation Protection Authority, and its experts, has decided to put the waste products into KONRAD containers in certified compliance with the repository storage conditions and to backfill these containers with concrete in accordance with approved procedures. Thus, waste packages suited for repository storage will be produced and corrosion processes and the possible release of radioactivity will be prevented. (orig.)