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French R&D on the Partitioning and Transmutation of Long-Lived Nuclear Development ISBN 92-64-02296-1 French R&D on the Partitioning and Transmutation of Long-lived Radionuclides An International Peer Review of the 2005 CEA Report © OECD 2006 NEA No. 6210 NUCLEAR ENERGY AGENCY ORGANISATION FOR ECONOMIC CO-OPERATION AND DEVELOPMENT ORGANISATION FOR ECONOMIC CO-OPERATION AND DEVELOPMENT The OECD is a unique forum where the governments of 30 democracies work together to address the economic, social and environmental challenges of globalisation. The OECD is also at the forefront of efforts to understand and to help governments respond to new developments and concerns, such as corporate governance, the information economy and the challenges of an ageing population. The Organisation provides a setting where governments can compare policy experiences, seek answers to common problems, identify good practice and work to co-ordinate domestic and international policies. The OECD member countries are: Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Korea, Luxembourg, Mexico, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, the Slovak Republic, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, the United Kingdom and the United States. The Commission of the European Communities takes part in the work of the OECD. OECD Publishing disseminates widely the results of the Organisation’s statistics gathering and research on economic, social and environmental issues, as well as the conventions, guidelines and standards agreed by its members. * * * This work is published on the responsibility of the Secretary-General of the OECD. The opinions expressed and arguments employed herein do not necessarily reflect the official views of the Organisation or of the governments of its member countries. NUCLEAR ENERGY AGENCY The OECD Nuclear Energy Agency (NEA) was established on 1st February 1958 under the name of the OEEC European Nuclear Energy Agency. It received its present designation on 20th April 1972, when Japan became its first non-European full member. NEA membership today consists of 28 OECD member countries: Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, Mexico, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, the Republic of Korea, the Slovak Republic, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, the United Kingdom and the United States. The Commission of the European Communities also takes part in the work of the Agency. The mission of the NEA is: to assist its member countries in maintaining and further developing, through international co- operation, the scientific, technological and legal bases required for a safe, environmentally friendly and economical use of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes, as well as to provide authoritative assessments and to forge common understandings on key issues as input to government decisions on nuclear energy policy and to broader OECD policy analyses in areas such as energy and sustainable development. Specific areas of competence of the NEA include safety and regulation of nuclear activities, radioactive waste management, radiological protection, nuclear science, economic and technical analyses of the nuclear fuel cycle, nuclear law and liability, and public information. The NEA Data Bank provides nuclear data and computer program services for participating countries. In these and related tasks, the NEA works in close collaboration with the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna, with which it has a Co-operation Agreement, as well as with other international organisations in the nuclear field. © OECD 2006 No reproduction, copy, transmission or translation of this publication may be made without written permission. Applications should be sent to OECD Publishing: [email protected] or by fax (+33-1) 45 24 13 91. Permission to photocopy a portion of this work should be addressed to the Centre Français d’exploitation du droit de Copie, 20 rue des Grands Augustins, 75006 Paris, France ([email protected]). FOREWORD An important activity of the OECD Nuclear Energy Agency (NEA) in the field of radioactive waste management is the organisation of independent, international peer reviews on national studies and projects. Member governments have found these reviews of significant value and are now asking for them to cover topics of a broader scope. The independent NEA peer reviews help national programmes to assess work accomplished. The reviews’ comments on issues of general relevance are also of potential interest to other member countries. The French Government requested that the NEA organise an international peer review of the “2005 Report: Partitioning and Transmutation” by the Commissariat à l’énergie atomique (CEA). The scope and objectives of the review were laid out in the Terms of Reference. According to the review’s Terms of Reference, the OECD/NEA Secretariat established an International Review Team (IRT) made up of ten international specialists, supported by members of the NEA Secretariat knowledgeable in the field. The peer review should assist the French Government, along with the institutions and organisations involved, in their debate on the role of partitioning and transmutation in the national nuclear waste disposal strategy and on the future work programme and priorities. Acknowledgments All of the IRT members would like to thank the CEA staff for their kind hospitality during the visits to France and for their organisational support which greatly facilitated the work of the IRT. The IRT would also like to thank all of the Commissariat à l’énergie atomique (CEA) and the Centre national de la recherche scientifique (CNRS) staff who took part in the review for the helpful and open manner in which they responded to the review and to the requests from the IRT. 3 TABLE OF CONTENTS Foreword....................................................................................................... 3 High-level Summary of the Review ............................................................ 7 Background .................................................................................................... 7 Overall evaluation from an international perspective .................................... 8 Conclusions and recommendations................................................................ 13 Overview........................................................................................................ 14 1. Introduction.......................................................................................... 15 1.1 Background..................................................................................... 15 1.2 The French nuclear programme...................................................... 16 1.3 Peer review objective...................................................................... 23 2. Review of Specific Aspects: Partitioning............................................ 25 2.1 Introduction..................................................................................... 25 2.2 Enhanced aqueous partitioning....................................................... 27 2.3 Pyrochemical partitioning............................................................... 34 2.4 Product conversion ......................................................................... 36 2.5 Recovery from glass ....................................................................... 38 3. Review of Specific Aspects: Transmutation....................................... 39 3.1 Introduction..................................................................................... 39 3.2 Transmutation systems ................................................................... 39 3.3 Supporting R&D............................................................................. 44 4. Conclusions ........................................................................................... 53 4.1 Scope and limits of the report......................................................... 53 4.2 Strategy........................................................................................... 53 4.3 Objectives ....................................................................................... 53 4.4 Achievements and IRT agreements ................................................ 54 4.5 Further developments and alternatives ........................................... 54 5 5. Recommendations ................................................................................ 57 5.1 Scope and limits of the report......................................................... 57 5.2 Aqueous partitioning and pyrochemistry........................................ 57 5.3 Product and fission product management....................................... 58 5.4 Fuels and targets ............................................................................. 58 5.5 Strategy: transmutation................................................................... 59 Appendix 1. Peer review by the OECD Nuclear Energy Agency: Terms of reference of the international review team................................ 61 Appendix 2. Members of the international review team .......................... 73 International members.................................................................................... 73 OECD/NEA Secretariat.................................................................................. 80 Glossary........................................................................................................
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