Abstracts of the ASN Report 2024

A new project is currently underway on the site with the “DESIR” facility, standing for Disintegration, Excitation and Storage of Radioactive Ions. The primary function of the DESIR project will be to create new experimentation areas based on beams of radioactive ions produced by the SPIRAL1 and S3 facilities (experimental area of the SPIRAL2 phase 1 facility). This project involves modifying the BNI perimeter. The examination of this file continued in 2024 and ASN issued a favourable opinion on the draft decree on 10 December 2024. Examination of the second periodic safety review of the facility is also in progress. The review inspection of 20 December 2023 confirmed the Ganil’s progress in characterising the defined requirements associated with the activities and elements important for the protection of interests and the progress in incorporating these changes into the baseline operating requirements. The licensee must formalise more precisely the methods of taking the human and organisational aspects into account in the modifications made to the facility. In the context of a national campaign in 2024 focusing on counterfeits, falsifications and suspicions of fraud, ASN observed that the licensee had taken measures to prevent, detect and address such infringements. However, these measures are not structured in a single process in the licensee’s integrated management system. ASNR will be attentive to the setting up of such a structured process. The licensee presented a change in its organisation in 2024, which should be effective in 2025. ASNR will be attentive to ensuring that the nuclear safety and radiation exposure risks are duly taken into account when it is implemented. La Hague site The Orano site at La Hague is located on the north-west tip of the Cotentin peninsula, in the Manche département, 20 km west of Cherbourg and 6 km from Cap de La Hague. The site is situated about fifteen kilometres from the Channel Islands. THE ORANO RECYCLAGE REPROCESSING PLANTS IN OPERATION AT LA HAGUE The La Hague plants for reprocessing fuel assemblies irradiated in the nuclear reactors are operated by Orano Recyclage La Hague. Commissioning of the various units of the fuel reprocessing and waste packaging plants UP3-A (BNI 116) and UP2‑800 (BNI 117) and the Effluent Treatment Station STE3 (BNI 118) spanned from 1986 (reception and storage of spent fuel assemblies) until 2002 (R4 plutonium treatment unit), with the majority of the process units being commissioned in 1989‑1990. The Decrees of 10 January 2003 set the individual reprocessing capacity of each of the two plants at 1,000 tonnes per year (t/year), in terms of the quantities of uranium and plutonium contained in the fuel assemblies before burn-up (in the reactor), and limit the total capacity of the two plants to 1,700 t/year. The limits and conditions for discharges and water intake by the site are defined by ASN resolutions 2022-DC-0724 and 2022-DC-0725 of 16 June 2022. Operations carried out in the plants The reprocessing plants comprise several industrial units, each intended for a particular operation. Consequently there are facilities for the reception and storage of spent fuel assemblies, for their shearing and dissolution, for the chemical separation of fission products, uranium and plutonium, for the purification of uranium and plutonium, for treating the effluents and for packaging the waste. When the spent fuel assemblies arrive at the plants in their transport casks, they are unloaded either “under water” in the spent fuel pool, or “dry” in a leaktight shielded cell. The fuel assemblies are then stored in pools to cool them down. They are then sheared and dissolved in nitric acid to separate the pieces of metal cladding from the spent nuclear fuel. The pieces of cladding, which are insoluble in nitric acid, are removed from the dissolver, rinsed in acid and then water, and transferred to a compacting and packaging unit. The nitric acid solution comprising the dissolved radioactive substances is then processed in order to extract the uranium and plutonium and leave the fission products and other transuranic elements. After purification, the uranium is concentrated and stored in the form of uranyl nitrate (UO2(NO3)2). It will then be converted into a stable solid compound (U3O8) in the TU5 facility on the Tricastin site. The uranium resulting from this process is called “reprocessed uranium”. After purification and concentration, the plutonium is precipitated by oxalic acid, dried, calcined into plutonium oxide, packaged in sealed containers and stored. The plutonium is then used for the fabrication of MOX (Mixed OXide) fuels in the Orano plant in Marcoule (Melox). The effluents and waste produced by the operation of the plants The fission products and other transuranic elements resulting from reprocessing are concentrated, vitrified and packaged in Standard vitrified waste packages (CSD-V). The pieces of metal cladding are compacted and packaged in Standard compacted waste packages (CSD-C). Furthermore, the reprocessing operations described in the previous paragraph involve chemical and mechanical processes which produce gaseous and liquid effluents and solid waste. The solid waste is packaged on site by either compaction or encapsulation in cement. The solid radioactive waste resulting from the reprocessing of the spent fuel assemblies 76 ABSTRACTS – ASN Report on the state of nuclear safety and radiation protection in France in 2024 Regional overview of nuclear safety and radiation protection NORMANDIE

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