Designing and construction of the Industrial Complex for Solid Radioactive Waste Management have been funded by the European Commission and Ukraine.
The Industrial Complex for Solid Radioactive Waste Management is designed to accept, process solid radioactive waste accumulated during operation and those waste generated during ChNPP decommissioning, and operational radioactive waste of the Shelter.
The Complex incorporates four facilities for solid radioactive waste management integrated in a single technological cycle.
Lot 0: Temporary Storage Facility for Low- and Intermediate-Level Long-Lived Waste and High-Level Waste (LILW and HLW) in the building of Liquid and Solid Waste Storage Facility (LSWSF). It was commissioned in 2010.
Lot 1: Facility for Retrieval of All-Type Solid Radioactive Waste from existing Solid Radioactive Waste Storage Facility.
Production capacity – retrieval of 3 m³ of radioactive waste (RAW) per day. Operational life – 30 years.
Lot 2: Plant for All-Type Solid Radioactive Waste Sorting and Low- and Intermediate-Level Waste Processing.
Production capacity:
● 20 m³ of non-processed RAW per day
● Incineration facility – 50 kg/h of solid RAW and 10 kg/h of liquid RAW
● Cementation facility – 10 m³ per day
● Facility for packaging low- and intermediate-level long-lived (LIL-LLW) and high-level waste – 1.5 m³ per day
Capacity of the temporary storage facility for LIL-LLW and HLW – 3,500 m³; operational life – 30 years.
Lot 3: Engineered Near-Surface Storage Facility for LIL Short-Lived Waste.
Capacity – 55,000 m³ of waste packages. Service life of equipment at infilling stage is 30 years. Term of state control of the preserved storage facility is 300 years.
First two Lots are built within the Chornobyl NPP industrial site, and Lot 3 is at “Vector” Complex site within the Exclusion Zone.
Basic information: Radioactive Waste Management
On May 23, 2014, an individual permit for the ICSRM commissioning was obtained expiring till work completion under commissioning stage 2 (“hot” testing).
Currently, the Complex is at preparatory phase for stage 3 of “hot” testing.
In the framework of such preparation, according to the developed procedure, the sampling is carried out from the eastern “low-level” compartment of the Solid RAW Storage Facility (SWSF) containing low-level waste; and its characterization is being performed at the Measuring Water-Radiochemical Laboratory. A western “low-level” compartment of the SWSF containing low-level waste is unsealed.
Also, the following operations are performed at the Complex: repacking of high-level waste from the Temporary Storage Facility for Solid RAW, with subsequent placement for temporary storage at the Temporary HLW Storage Facility, and low- and intermediate-level long-lived waste under the Expanded Program of ICSRM “Hot” Testing Stage 2.
In 2018, 16 RAW packages produced during “active” testing were transported to the “Vector” Complex for disposal.