This paper highlights current trends and developments in selecting decommissioning strategies worldwide. Radiological conditions, spent fuel and radioactive waste management, funding, economics and the development of suitable technology are some common factors for taking decisions on the timing and circumstances of decommissioning. Although safe enclosure is the default option for many shut down facilities typically due to lack of ready cash, delay in dismantling may have serious disadvantages such as loss of expertise and long term uncertainties. Currently, of the many large nuclear installations permanently shut down, only a fraction have been or will be in the near term totally dismantled and decommissioned to unrestricted release state. A trend towards immediate dismantling seems to emerge in some countries, and is supported by IAEA positions, but this appears to be due to country-, site- or plant-specific conditions of limited generic applicability. In recent years, and often as the result of international efforts, the situation is evolving, and provisions and infrastructures including funding are being established to cope with decommissioning challenges. This factor seems in principle to encourage immediate, total dismantling. However, the worldwide overview of decommissioning strategies does not offer a clear pattern. New factors have come into being, such as stakeholder opinions, in particular those of local communities, and now play a significant role in decision-making. The conditions of the nuclear industry at large (e.g. the “nuclear renaissance”) considerably changed over the last few years and are going to affect decommissioning in the near future. Strategies such as restricted release (brownfields), incremental decommissioning or entombment seem to offer new prospects. The author reviewed first the worldwide situation around the year 2000, and offers in this paper some reflections about changed world’s conditions and how these affect the decommissioning scenarios.
Skip Nav Destination
ASME 2009 12th International Conference on Environmental Remediation and Radioactive Waste Management
October 11–15, 2009
Liverpool, UK
Conference Sponsors:
- Nuclear Engineering Division and Environmental Engineering Division
ISBN:
978-0-7918-4408-3
PROCEEDINGS PAPER
Decommissioning Strategies Worldwide: A Re-Visited Overview of Relevant Factors Available to Purchase
Michele Laraia
Michele Laraia
International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Vienna, Austria
Search for other works by this author on:
Michele Laraia
International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Vienna, Austria
Paper No:
ICEM2009-16016, pp. 263-273; 11 pages
Published Online:
December 12, 2010
Citation
Laraia, M. "Decommissioning Strategies Worldwide: A Re-Visited Overview of Relevant Factors." Proceedings of the ASME 2009 12th International Conference on Environmental Remediation and Radioactive Waste Management. ASME 2009 12th International Conference on Environmental Remediation and Radioactive Waste Management, Volume 2. Liverpool, UK. October 11–15, 2009. pp. 263-273. ASME. https://doi.org/10.1115/ICEM2009-16016
Download citation file:
17
Views
Related Proceedings Papers
Related Articles
A Happy New Year…
ASME J of Nuclear Rad Sci (January,2019)
Below the Horizon
Mechanical Engineering (December,2010)
An Approach for Testing Methods for Modeling Uncertainty
J. Mech. Des (September,2006)
Related Chapters
Spent Fuel and Decommissioning
Decommissioning Handbook
Containment Systems for Transportation and Storage Packaging of Spent Fuel and High-Level Radioactive Waste and Spent Fuel
Companion Guide to the ASME Boiler & Pressure Vessel Code, Volume 1, Second Edition
Development of Nuclear Boiler and Pressure Vessels in Taiwan
Companion Guide to the ASME Boiler and Pressure Vessel Code, Volume 3, Third Edition