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8.2. TESTIMONIS DE LES ENTITATS PER A L’ACTIVITAT 8 Fotomovimiento
Belgium has no specific regulation with regard to disused sealed sources. The same conditions and licenses are applicable to these sources as those regarding new sources: operation licenses, transport licenses for the carriers and import licenses are required as well as the application of the ruling European regulation 1493/93 on shipments of radioactive substances between Member States. The user/holder can either transport these sources to ONDRAF/NIRAS as declared radioactive waste or, if it is stipulated in the contract, he can return them to the deliverer/producer.
In case a Belgian producer takes back the sources, they are subject to the same regulatory requirements as those regarding the import of new sources, including the application of the regulation 1493/93. The producer has to take these used sources in “decay storage” or has to transfer them to ONDRAF/NIRAS.
Aware of the risks associated with the use of sealed radioactive sources and, in particular, of “orphan sources”, the European Union has promulgated a directive (2003/122/Euratom) on the control of these sources. This initiative finds its justification in the significant number of accidents that happened worldwide during these recent years.
The purpose of this directive is to prevent the public and the workers from being exposed to ionising radiation resulting from an inadequate control of sealed sources. Its provisions will cover all sources emitting, at the time of its production, a dose flow equal or greater than 1 mSv/h at 1 meter, and all orphan sources. This directive completes the Directive 96/29/EURATOM laying down basic safety standards for the health protection of the general public and workers against the hazards of ionising radiation, already integrated in the Belgian Law.
The Directive sets out the obligation for each Member State to set up a system requiring prior license for the holder of a sealed source. The license will only be granted if the competent authorities have taken appropriate measures for the safe use of the source, including when it becomes disused. A financial guarantee will have to be set up for the disposal and storage of the source when it becomes disused, or arrangement to return the source to the supplier or to a recognised storage installation will have to be made.
The license must cover different fields: responsibilities of the holders, staff competencies, information and training requirements for workers and people working in the vicinity of the sources, minimum equipment and packaging performance criteria, procedures to be followed in case of an accident, transfer modalities …
Each source will be identified by a standard record sheet indicating, among others, the name of the holder, the location, the transfers, the nature of the radio-isotopes and the results of regular integrity tests. The packaging and, if possible, the sources will be marked by a unique identification number. The competent authorities receive regularly updated copy of these sheets.
The holder has the obligation to check regularly the location and the good state of the sources in his possession and to warn immediately the competent authority of any disappearance or accidents having led to an exposure. The competent authority can perform any useful control to check that the directive is correctly applied. The holder is also to transfer forthwith every disused source to a recognised installation or to the supplier, according to the arrangements made.
The competent authorities must establish appropriate provisions in order to recover orphan sources and to deal with radiological emergencies resulting from any misuse of these sources. The Member States are encouraged to develop controls aimed at detecting orphan sources in places where orphan sources may be encountered such as metal scrap recycling installations. Campaigns for recovering the orphan sources shall be organised.
A fund financed by guarantees shall be established to cover the costs for recovering the orphan sources when the liabilities can not be identified or when the liable person is insolvent. This Directive has been transposed in the Belgian regulations by the Royal Decree of 26 May 2006, amending accordingly the GRR-2001.
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Section K: Planned activities to improve safety
At national level, as presented in this report, Belgium has developed a framework to cope with the safe management of spent fuel and radioactive waste.
Nevertheless, the FANC is going to improve the GRR-2001, and several large projects have been launched in 2007-2008, related to:
- The development of a regulatory framework for the licensing of future facilities for long term storage and disposal of radioactive wastes (surface and geological)
- In addition, two regulatory projects have been launched in 2008, with the objective of the implementation of the WENRA waste & spent fuel storage and decommissioning reference levels in the Belgian regulation.
On the practical field, the following safety improvement measures are planned or ongoing:
- The implementation of safety improvement actions resulting from the PSRs of class I facilities (Belgoprocess, nuclear reactor installations);
- The objective to comply with the WENRA reference levels on the practical field at relatively short term (around 2010).
Most of the issues related to the safe management of spent fuel and radioactive waste are dealt with at international level in different groups where experts are gathered. Belgium is and will continue to be active in international groups, such as the Waste Safety Standards Committee (WASSC) of the IAEA, the Radioactive Waste Management Committee (RWMC) of the NEA, and in European Union initiatives.
In addition, FANC is involved in many bilateral cooperations. FANC has signed specific cooperation agreements with the French Safety Authorities (ASN), with the US-NRC and with the Safety Authorities of the Russian Federation.
Finally within the frame of the High Level Group of European regulators, the FANC has taken commitments to organize a self assessment as well as to plan an IRRS IAEA mission. Specific actions, on-going or planned by ONDRAF/NIRAS are listed and explained below:
For the long-term management of the short-lived waste (SL-LILW or category A waste) ONDRAF/NIRAS is preparing in interaction with the FANC/AFCN, the licence application file (including the safety report and the environmental impact assessment) for a near surface repository in Dessel. ONDRAF/NIRAS plans to apply for a construction and operation licence for the surface disposal facility, in view of an operational facility by 2016.
In collaboration with its subsidiary company Belgoprocess ONDRAF/NIRAS is preparing the licence application file for the post-conditioning facility for the production of the monoliths (emplacement of conditioned category A waste and, possibly, non-conditioned waste, e.g. decommissioning waste, in a concrete box for surface disposal). Belgoprocess plans to apply for a construction and operation licence for this facility by the end of 2010. Once this post-conditioning facility operational (planned by 2016) the stored category A waste drums in the storage buildings 150 and 151 on the Belgoprocess site, can be post-conditioned for surface disposal and, after acceptance for disposal, transfer to the repository can start.
ONDRAF/NIRAS and Belgoprocess will continue their inspection programme of all the conditioned waste in the different storage buildings in view of a complete inspection of all stored waste by 2012. The analysis and investigations of the degradation mechanisms leading to non – conform waste packages (corrosion of waste packages and swelling of bituminous waste) will be continued in order to define and implement the required corrective measures. The post-conditioning of the category A waste packages in monoliths for surface disposal will be an important step towards the long-term management of non-conform category A waste packages.
In conformity with its legally defined tasks ONDRAF/NIRAS is preparing a national plan for the long-term management of radioactive waste in Belgium (waste plan). ONDRAF/NIRAS is currently preparing the supporting documents, as well as the document describing the general approach to the waste plan. As required by the law of 13 February 2006 ONDRAF/NIRAS is also preparing a Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA), focussing at the long-term management of the high-level and long-lived waste. The SEA will on the one hand compare various long-term management options for the high-level and long-lived waste and on the other hand assess their environmental impacts. The steps before submission for adoption of a final waste plan are:
- Participative dialogue with the general public and experts – March and April 2009 - Proposal to the advisory committee of scope and level of detail of the SEA by May-June
2009;
- Submission of the draft waste plan and the SEA to the advisory bodies (incl. the general
public) as defined by the law of 13 February 2006 – begin 2010
- Drafting of the final waste plan in view of its submission for adoption by mid 2010.
It is ONDRAF/NIRAS’ intention to focus its 2010 waste plan, and consequently also the SEA, on the long-term waste management of the high-level and long-lived waste (categories B & C waste), with the aim to obtain a national decision-in-principle on the reference option for this long-term management. Besides this main focus of the waste plan, it will also identify remaining key issues for the long-term management of other waste streams, to be addressed in (a) subsequent waste plan(s).
Considering its impact on the guarantee of conformity of the conditioned radioactive waste packages and on the safety of the storage and disposal facilities, ONDRAF/NIRAS continues to implement the qualification process of the radioactive waste processing, conditioning and storage facilities. It must be borne in mind that ONDRAF/NIRAS only accepts conditioned radioactive waste produced and characterized in facilities qualified by the agency.
Considering its impact on the safety of the disposal site for conditioned radioactive waste packages, the qualification by ONDRAF/NIRAS of the radiological characterization methods for radioactive waste will be extended to the methods applied to determine the uncertainties affecting the waste activity declarations. In view of the importance of this aspect of the radiological characterization of radioactive waste, ONDRAF/NIRAS will issue the necessary rules, principles and directives to maintain the general coherence of the calculation methods applied.
The processing and conditioning of two important waste streams on the site of Belgoprocess will continue:
- the historical alpha contaminated and radium-bearing waste on site Belgoprocess 2 is being processed and conditioned in the HRA-Solarium facility; the conditioned waste is send for storage in the interim storage building 155 on site BP1. The conditioning of this waste and the transfer to site 1 for storage, which will continue the following years, significantly
improves the safety on the Belgoprocess site and reduces the dose rates in the immediate surroundings of site 2, without noticeably increasing dose rates around site 1;
- Alpha-contaminated waste from MOX fuel fabrication. This waste is being processed and conditioned in the PAMELA facility and the conditioned waste is stored in building 155 on Belgoprocess site 1.