Sweden’s Land and Environment Court has scheduled its main hearing in September on permit applications for a proposed spent nuclear fuel repository and nearby encapsulation facility.
”This is a welcome decision. The environmental assessment is an important step in our task to deal with all the radioactive waste from nuclear power plants in Sweden in a safe way. We submitted our application in 2011 and we are ready to have it examined by the court,” Christopher Eckerberg, president of the Swedish Nuclear Fuel and Waste Management Co. (SKB), said in a press release Monday.
The underground repository would be built at the village of Forsmark, within the east coast municipality of Östhammar, while the plant to encapsulate the fuel in copper and cast iron would be located in the nearby municipality of Oskarshamn.
The disposal method, which SKB calls KBS-3, involves placing fuel pellets within copper canisters that are stored underground in Bentonite clay within bedrock.
Sweden’s spent fuel is currently held in temporary storage at Oskarshamn.
