It is an island, attached to the mainland, near the Gulf of Bothnia in the Baltic Sea. In a country that obtains 33% of its energy from nuclear power and has already shown itself to be an innovator in this field by launching an EPR last year, 13 years late. The island of Olkiluoto will once again become Finland’s nuclear laboratory: in 2025 it will put into operation a nuclear waste cemetery that is expected to last 100,000 years.
It will be located 400 metres below the island’s forests. The fuels, used and coming in particular from the EPR, will be placed in copper cartridges in a sealed clay tomb. This, after having spent several years in cooling pools intended to lower the temperature. The tomb will be sealed with a concrete latch, according to the storage principle called “multiple barrier”.
The location is considered ideal because of the absence of fractures in the rock, which would have allowed contact between water and clay. A clay that operators believe would be impermeable anyway. Ultimately, the site will resemble an immense storage reserve, crossed by galleries, over an area two kilometres wide.
Finland is a decade ahead
The method developed by the Swedish waste management company SKB and the private operator Posiva, financed by the large companies TVO and Fortum, is unprecedented on this scale. Finland is, in particular, ten years ahead of Sweden, which is also involved in such programmes; Canada and Switzerland are also leading the way.
The site was selected in the 1980s for its geological qualities; in addition, nuclear operators were responsible, from the moment the reactors were installed, for future waste management. In contrast, the United States, for example, has responsibility for this management at the federal level; the same is true for France with Andra (National Agency for Radioactive Waste Management).
France is also moving forward
In France, there is a project of this kind: a similar site is being built in Bure (Meuse), led by Cigeo. It is facing significant protests on the ground, from the owners – some of whom are to be expropriated – and from environmental associations and activists who point out the risks of this type of installation and of the nuclear industry in a broader sense.
The Constitutional Council validated the project, after it was referred to it, considering that it “does not ignore” the rights of future generations. It was also classified as a public utility project by the Council of State at the end of 2023, which allows for the acceleration of procedures and, in particular, expropriation.
The Bure site still needs to be subject to a permit issued by the Nuclear Safety Authority, which will allow the start of a testing phase. This is not expected before 2027. If delivered, the site should be able to store 83,000 m³ with an estimated cost in 2016 of 25 billion euros. These capacities and costs are much higher than those of the Finnish project, which cost one billion dollars.
Source: BFM TV
