Processing of Historic High Radioactive Waste Coming From Nuclear Applications

At ECN-NRG irradiations of materials have been performed with the aid of the High Flux Reactor at the site for investigations of their properties under different conditions as well for nuclear isotope productions since 1967 e.g. molybdenum. The high radioactive waste (HRW) coming from these nuclear applications are stored since the start in an interim storage facility located at the site. Due to the site license the HRW has to be transported to COVRA. Therefore a project has been set-up to transport all the HRW to COVRA. However, COVRA accepts a limited number of HLW containers among the CASTOR® MTR-2 container and thus all temporary stored drums have to be over packed. As the existing infra structure at the site is not suited a new facility has to be build. This also creates the opportunity to minimize, by separation of the HRW in low- and intermediate level waste, the amount of waste that has to be classified as HLW. The applied methodology, design and specifications of the HRW-ILW non-destructive assay characterization and separation system will be described.