[en] This presentation deals with the Russian special plants ''Radon'', a system of 16 regional plants devoted to radioactive waste management. The plants are intended to receive solid radioactive wastes and liquid radioactive wastes of low and medium levels of activity for reprocessing and final disposal. The following topics are discussed: (1) waste characterization, (2) storage construction, (3) preparation of waste for burial, (4) site selection, (5) tasks of the plant, (6) division of plant territory into zones, (7) radiation monitoring, (8) prevention of accidents and elimination of their consequences, (10) training of staff, (11) sanitary treatment of staff and equipment decontamination. Lack of financial means is a major problem. The closure of the Murmansk special plant Radon has caused great problems for the North-European District. The Leningrad special plant Radon has been forced to accept radioactive waste from the Arkhangelsk region. The exhaustion of reserve volumes for solid radioactive waste acceptance at this plant affects the entire North-Western Russia. At present, spent sources of ionising radiation are buried in shallow land-based storage facilities of well type. It was found on inspection that such burial of sources containing nuclides with half-life of more than 30 years must be stopped. Existing storages are inadequate for safe storage of such sources throughout their hazardous period, and are not adjusted for extraction of such sources in the future. The spent sources containing long-lived nuclides must be temporarily stored in transport containers in separate sections of solid waste storage facilities. In 1997, analysis of radiation state parameters for radioactive waste burial at special plants Radon showed that the radiation dose rate at working places and the average annual volumetric activity of radionuclides in the environment were within the admissible limits

[en] This presentation examines the main approaches in current radioactive waste management at the Production Association ''Mayak'' (PA ''Mayak''), the former Chemical Engineering Plant ''Mayak''. This plant began as a manufacturer of plutonium for the Soviet nuclear weapons industry and later started production of nuclear material for non-military purposes. The presentation describes the wastes that have accumulated at PA ''Mayak'' and its management. They have 19000 m3 high-level waste in suspensions, 11700 m3 in nitrate solutions and 1974 m3 of nitrified waste. The corresponding radioactivities are, in million Ci, 135, 249 and 246

[en] According to this presentation, handling of radioactive waste from the Russian nuclear submarines (NS) is complex because of a lack of sufficient infrastructure for the management of such wastes. The considerable part of decommissioned NSs is located at the main bases of the North and Pacific Navies and at the territories of the enterprises dealing with building and maintenance of NSs. Existing stationary and floating facilities for radioactive wastes are practically filled up completely and there is no adequate reserve facilities. Norway and the USA render their assistance in increasing the existing capacity of the liquid radioactive waste reprocessing facility of Atomflot, and Japan assists in the creation of a floating facility at Zvezda in the far east. The coastal infrastructure created in the 1960s for radioactive waste processing and long-term storage at the Fleet was not commissioned. The present storage facilities, particularly of trench and open type, are dangerous contamination sources for the environment. Realisation of the full-scaled and complex disposal scheme for reactor compartments of disposed NSs requires the solution of a large number of problems and the fundamental requirements on this work are outlined

[en] As discussed in this presentation, the decommissioning of scrapped nuclear vessels in Russia has been too fast for the existing waste management plants to keep pace with. Existing facilities were designed to service the fleet in operation and are filled up. The development of new infrastructure for handling radioactive waste and spent nuclear fuel is impeded by the lack of financial means. A large number of nuclear submarines are now laid up with the nuclear fuel still loaded, but the President and the Government have decided to speed up unloading of the spent fuel. The bottleneck is the discharge of the spent nuclear fuel. The Navy has three floating storage facilities for the purpose. The Navy performs many technological decommissioning operations that would have been more appropriately left for shipyards and specialised civil industrial enterprises. Coastal discharge plants at larger shipyards are planned on the North and the Pacific regions of Russia. These are built with US support. The containers used for transport to the Mayak storage are discussed. A metal-concrete container programme is executed in co-operation with Norway and the US. Mayak does not have the capacity for long-term storage of spent nuclear fuel. A temporary storage facility at Mayak has been designed by a consortium of enterprises from Norway, Sweden, UK and France. Lepse, a service-ship for the nuclear icebreaker fleet, was laid up in 1990. It contains spent nuclear fuel assemblies in such bad condition that they cannot easily be discharged. There is an international project for decommissioning Lepse. The Russians consider this a pilot project. The problems of the civil nuclear fleet are similar to those of the Navy

[en] According to this presentation, decommissioning and disposal of nuclear submarines is a problem of great concern in Russia. So far more than 150 nuclear submarines have been removed from the Fleet and will be disposed of. Future disposals were not taken into consideration when the shipyards were constructed. Nuclear vessels with loaded cores stay afloat waiting for their turn to be disposed of, often with damaged safety assurance systems and a potential for causing major ecological catastrophes. The presentation deals briefly with some international programmes in progress at Nerpa in Murmansk, Zvezda in Primorye and Zvezdochka in Arkhangelsk and then discusses in more detail the experience of disposal at the Zvezdochka, which under the Start-2 agreement is defined as one of the enterprises dealing with the disposal of strategic nuclear submarines. There they have the qualified staff and the equipment needed. Spent nuclear fuel unloading and removal is the most acute problem

[en] This presentation describes the Nordic Nuclear Safety Research (NKS) programme, which is a scientific co-operation programme in nuclear safety, radiation protection and emergence preparedness. The purpose of the programme is to carry out cost-effective Nordic projects, thus producing research results, exercises, information, manuals, recommendations, and other types of background material. This material is to serve decision-makers and other concerned staff members at authorities, research establishments and enterprises in the nuclear field. Three waste disposal projects under NKS are briefly described: (1) Waste characterisation, (2) Performance analysis of the engineered barrier system of the repositories for low- and intermediate-level waste, (3) Environmental impact assessment

[en] This presentation discusses some ideas on what the Best Practical Environmental Option (BPEO) process should include. A BPEO study to help develop a radioactive waste management strategy should not only look at post-closure safety of a facility. In the UK there was a 1986 Study of BPEOs for management of low and intermediate level radioactive wastes. This study tried to answer important questions such as (1) What are the practical options, (2) Which wastes should go to shallow burial, (3) Which wastes should go to sea disposal, (4) How does storage compare with disposal and (5) What are the cost and environmental trade-offs. The presentation discusses what was done to answer the questions. The BPEO Study resulted in major improved effort to characterise waste, much greater quantitative understanding of where and when the real costs, and environmental and radiological impacts arise. All options would be useful within a national strategy. But there was clearly a need for resolution of political acceptance problems, integration of policy with other hazardous waste management, and stronger legal framework

[en] This presentation on radioactive waste management in Russia discusses criteria for the selection of disposal sites, how the various types of waste should be contained and stored, and gives a list showing the liable owner, type, volume, activity and storage place of the present amount of radioactive waste. The bulk of this waste, in volume and radioactivity, is at the enterprises of Minatom of the Russian Federation

[en] In Russia, the system of the legal acts regulating radioactive waste management is now in progress. Development of the federal norms and regulations on the use of atomic energy is a responsibility of Gosatomnazdor. This presentation describes in detail the work done by Gosatomnadzor in 1997/1998 on the development of the legal documents regulating the management of radioactive waste and spent nuclear material. A document of special importance is ''Burial of Radioactive Wastes. Principles, Criteria and Basic Safety Requirements''. This is discussed in some detail. For all stages of radioactive waste management, safety criteria for population and personnel are set up in strict analogy with current legislation for any other type of radiological hazard. A combined, or hybrid, safety criterion is suggested for estimation of long-term safety of radioactive waste repository systems, for the period upon termination of the established administrative monitoring after closing the repository. A dose criterion is accepted for normal radiation exposure and a risk criterion for potential radiation exposure. The safety of radioactive waste repository should be ensured by means of graded safeguard throughout the entire period of burial. Graded safeguard is based on independent barriers on the way of ionising radiation and emission of radioactive substances into the environment and protection and maintenance of these barriers. Examples show how the provisions of the document are applied in practice in the permafrost area of Russia. Permafrost soil has low water permeability, which is significant because underground water is the main transport medium in case of a leakage from a repository

[en] In the Arkhangelsk and Murmansk regions of Russia, radioactive wastes and spent nuclear fuel from the Northern Fleet and Mineconomiki, the technological repairing plant Atomflot and the Kola nuclear power plant and other activities is accumulating steadily and there is no adequate waste management system in the region. There is an action plan to remedy the situation, but it has been delayed because of insufficient funds. This presentation lists the volumes of liquid and solid radioactive wastes from these sources in 1996 and the expected volumes in 2020. It also lists the specific problems of the present waste management and main proposals of the action plan. In addition to federal funds, a number of projects are financed through international co-operation