Twenty-eight canisters of vitrified highly active waste arrived in Cherbourg, France, on Monday as the shipment makes its way from the U.K. to Switzerland, French nuclear specialist AREVA announced Wednesday.
The waste is the byproduct of reprocessing and recycling activity at the U.K.’s Sellafield site, where fuel from Swiss nuclear reactors was sent. The shipment falls under the vitrified residue return program, which is the U.K. Nuclear Decommissioning Authority’s (NDA) approach to repatriating highly active waste from the United Kingdom. This is the second of two planned shipments to Switzerland. The first shipment, completed in September 2015, also involved 28 containers.
Under the program Sellafield Ltd. collaborates with NDA subsidiary International Nuclear Services (INS), which has contracted AREVA to manage the overland transport. Sellafield spokesman Matt Legg said the NDA does not release exact details on arrivals for security reasons. He also declined to release specifics regarding the cost of the shipment, citing commercial confidentiality reasons.
“Costs incurred in repatriating waste are paid for by the customer under the terms of our reprocessing contracts,” Legg said by email Wednesday.
The vessel shuttling the waste departed from the port of Barrow-in-Furness on Oct. 7. The flasks will now be unloaded in Cherbourg for rail shipment to Switzerland.
