SV: AW: [ RadSafe ] The world's first permanent disposal sitefor used nuclear fuel will be at Forsmark, Sweden's SKB announcedtoday.
Olsson Mattias :MSO
mso at forsmark.vattenfall.se
Fri Jun 5 04:40:07 CDT 2009
Hi,
Swedish decision makers ARE informed. A political decision has been taken that says that Sweden is to follow the once-through concept regarding fuel usage. No reprocessing. It has also been decided that the industry must supply a long-term solution to the spent fuel (and other waste) issue. Nuclear power in general has been a hot potato since the 70s. It's only lately that things are getting slightly more sensible.
Also, I wonder if Forsmark will really be first. Finland has taken the same concept as Sweden has been developing, and as so often, Finland are more swift with decisions. See POSIVA's web site: http://www.posiva.fi/en/final_disposal
With this concept it will be possible to retrieve the spent fuel in the future. The same can not be said about the "deep drilled holes" concept that has been discarded as unsafe for many years due to several fundamental flaws, but the environmental movement now has it as their thing that it has not been investigated enough.
When the Oskarshamn and Forsmark sites were compared, the rock quality was a very important issue. The Forsmark rock generally has a much more suitable quality. You can suspect as much just from looking at drill samples by eye. Massive data has been collected as well, for example on diffusion behaviour and adsorption of numerous nuclides.
Best regards,
Mattias Olsson, Forsmark NPP
-----Ursprungligt meddelande-----
Från: radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl [mailto:radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl] För George Stanford
Skickat: den 5 juni 2009 01:46
Till: radsafe at radlab.nl
Ämne: Re: AW: [ RadSafe ] The world's first permanent disposal sitefor used nuclear fuel will be at Forsmark, Sweden's SKB announcedtoday.
Franz & All:
Thanks to Bjorn Cederval for the additional
info. At one of the sites
(<http://www.thelocal.se/19824>)
there is this:
>"The Swedish technique consists of storing
>two tonnes of spent fuel in copper-coated
>canisters that weigh 25 tonnes each.
>
>"Each canister is welded shut using a special
>technique and then mechanically deposited in
>a tunnel in the repository.
>
>"A buffer of bentonite clay, a volcanic ash that
>when mixed with water swells to provide a
>watertight barrier and protect against
>earthquakes, is then injected to fill the hole in
>the rock.
>
>"'The canisters are buried several metres apart
>so he rock can absorb the heat generated by the
>radioactive materials in each copper canister.'
>Engholm explains.
>
>"Once a tunnel in the repository is full, the tunnel is
>filled in with a mixture of bentonite and rock."
It does not appear that ease of retrievability is
one of the design requirements.
-- George
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
At 01:39 PM 6/4/2009, George Stanford wrote:
Franz:
If the decision makers in Sweden were aware
of the points that I listed, they would not be
emulating the mistake the US has made with Yucca
Mountain. They would instead, in my opinion, be
going with temporary surface storage (the route
the US now seems to be taking in its bumbling
efforts to accommodate ill-informed political
pressures), pending the implementation of fast
reactors.
I don't agree that lack of awareness of fast-
reactor capability makes people "idiots." It
merely means that they are uninformed (and it's our
fault). But IF the used fuel will indeed be easily retrievable, that would be at least a partial vindication. All I know is what the article said: "buried in clay," "isolated for 100,000 years." You seem to be just assuming that "surely they would not be so dumb as to make it inaccessible." I hope you are right. Can you refer us to any official confirmation that your supposition is correct?
And your remarks about the sad US record are
indeed to the point But at least the stuff to be
stored at Yucca Mountain was intended to be
retrievable for the first 100 years. Now this
country has reverted to surface storage -- which
is probably good, as the awareness slowly spreads
that fast reactors hold the solution, and that
Yucca Mountain has been money largely wasted.
Sweden could postpone the repository decision, and
save a lot of money.
The important thing, from my perspective, is
that we in the nuclear-power profession have been
far too reticent in letting the rest of the world
know that, properly managed, uranium can power
civilization from here on out -- safely,
affordably, and with fewer environmental
consequences than any other energy source.
-- George
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~`
At 06:52 AM 6/4/2009, Franz Schönhofer wrote:
George and other RADSAFErs,
I cannot take this message to be serious. I recall your previous comments, which were directed to my experience of the Chernobyl accident and tried to ridicule my experience of far more than ten years on this case. I further recall your similarly ridiculous comments on my experience as the head of the IAEA terrestrial working group on the Mururoa Project. So now you continue to distribute your ridiculous comments, using the Forsmark plans for disposal of use nuclear fuel.
A very short answer to your comments (questions), which imply that Swedish scientists are simply idiots and do not know anything about the nuclear fuel cycle. (I am not Swedish, though I know the language fluently.) How can you dare to put that forward on an international newsgroup?
How can you dare to put such a question on RADSAFE, taking into account that the world-wide signal has been distributed by the US-Carter administration, backing those anti-nuclear groups and which was of course used by the so-called "greens"? One of their most important goals always was - officially - the breaking of the nuclear fuel cycle. In the USA they obviously succeeded.
Ask your own US administration and don't blame anything on the European situation. Reprocessing is going on in Europe, but since decades it has been stalled in the USA - blame your own administration.
To all of my information, which might be wrong, the so called "final repositories" planned in Europe will allow retrieval of the fuel rods.
Think twice before you again write such a nonsensical message to RADSAFE.
Franz
Franz Schoenhofer, PhD
MinRat i.R.
Habicherg. 31/7
A-1160 Wien/Vienna
AUSTRIA
-----Ursprüngliche Nachricht-----
Von: radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl [mailto:radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl] Im Auftrag von George Stanford
Gesendet: Mittwoch, 03. Juni 2009 21:14
An: Cary Renquist
Cc: radsafe at radlab.nl
Betreff: Re: [ RadSafe ] The world's first permanent disposal site forused nuclear fuel will be at Forsmark, Sweden's SKB announced today.
Is there nobody influential in Sweden who
knows that the used fuel that they're going to
bury in clay -- presumably irretrievably -- still
retains 95% of the energy it started with?
Nobody who knows that fast reactors can access that energy?
Nobody who knows that the waste form fast
reactors (such as the IFR) is mainly fission products (one ton per GWe-year)?
Nobody who knows that the activity of that
waste becomes too low to worry about within 500 years?
Nobody who knows that 90% of the ore's
energy remains in the depleted uranium that's
left over from the enrichment process -- energy
that also can be used by fast reactors?
Nobody who knows that the IFR technology is
ready now for a commercial-scale demonstration?
We don't seem to be very good at telling
people about what nuclear power can do for the world, do we?
George Stanford
Reactor physicist, retired
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
At 01:43 PM 6/3/2009, Cary Renquist wrote:
Forsmark for Swedish nuclear waste
03 June 2009
The world's first permanent disposal site for
used nuclear fuel will be at Forsmark, Sweden's SKB announced today.
The decision was announced by SKB President,
Claes Thegerström today after a board meeting
yesterday. Forsmark, in the municipality of
Östhammar, was selected in favour of Laxemar in
the Oskarshamn municipality after a process of
investigation and engagement that has lasted since 2002.
Site works towards the underground facility could
begin in 2013, with full construction starting in
2015 and operation in 2023. This single facility,
using only 15 hectares above ground, would hold
all of the high-level radioactive waste from the
nuclear power reactors that provide about 45% of
Sweden's electricity. SKB will apply to nuclear
safety regulators for premission to build in around one year's time.
The repository is designed to isolate the wastes
for the 100,000 years it will take until their
levels of radiation return to the original low
levels of natural uranium. Used nuclear fuel
assemblies are to be packed in cast iron baskets
within thick copper canisters and packed in clay
almost 500 metres below gound in a continguous
section of igneous rock. At that level,
groundwater movement is so slow that the wastes
could never affect life at the surface. The
method, known as KBS-3, was selected in 1983.
The competition to host the site was hard fought,
with both communities taking keen interest - both municipalities already have nuclear facilities. Forsmark already hosts a nuclear power plant and the final repository for short-lived radioactive waste, but its selection for this facility comes as something of a surprise. The used fuel for disposition at the CLAB interim store is in the Oskarshamn municipality near Laxemar, as will be the encapsulation plant. Also in that region is the Äspö hard rock laboratory where much of the practical work to demonstrate the disposal method has taken place
---
Cary Renquist
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