Return transport of high-level radioactive waste from reprocessing in France to Philippsburg approved

Fuel element interim storage facility Philippsburg Source: Christopher Mick

A transport licence has been granted for the remaining high-level radioactive waste from the reprocessing of fuel elements from German nuclear power plants, which is to be returned from France. Following an audit by the Federal Office for the Safety of Nuclear Waste Management, the transport company Orano NCS GmbH has demonstrated that it meets all the necessary safety requirements.

The transport of high-level radioactive waste by rail in a maximum of four transport and storage casks is licensed up to and including 31 December 2024. The applicant will coordinate the specific details of when and how the transport will take place, in particular with the relevant federal and state safety authorities and the Federal Railway Authority, which is the competent nuclear regulatory authority for rail transport. Germany must take back the waste in accordance with international law.

Storage licence for Philippsburg has been granted

In July 2023, the Federal Office for the Safety of Nuclear Waste Management granted a licence for the storage of vitrified waste at the Philippsburg interim storage facility. The return of the four containers will not exhaust the licensed number of containers for high-level radioactive waste at the Philippsburg site. In fact, the Philippsburg interim storage facility is licensed to store a maximum of 152 containers of high-level radioactive waste. Including the containers with the vitrified waste from La Hague, there will be 46 fewer high-level waste containers than originally planned.

Background: Return of the German waste

To date, vitrified radioactive waste from German nuclear power plants is located in the UK and France. Until 2005, German utilities had shipped irradiated fuel from their nuclear power plants to these countries for reprocessing. The resulting liquid waste was then vitrified and has since been gradually returned. Since 2005, the shipment of fuel elements from German nuclear power plants for so-called reprocessing has been prohibited. Instead, an amendment to the Atomic Energy Act obliged nuclear power plant operators to store the irradiated fuel elements in interim storage facilities at the reactor sites.

Fulfilment of international obligations

Germany is obliged under international law to take back the waste from reprocessing. Five CASTOR containers with vitrified intermediate-level waste and 152 containers with high-pressure compacted intermediate-level metal residues were originally to be taken back from France by the end of 2024. As these shipments could not be carried out within the planned timeframe, a new solution was negotiated with France. Instead of the 157 containers with medium-level radioactive waste, Germany will take back the four containers with vitrified high-level radioactive waste licensed here. In addition, the utilities will ensure the recycling of up to 30 empty spent fuel element transport casks.

The transport authorised here will thus take back the last high-level radioactive waste from France. However, in order to fulfil international obligations towards the United Kingdom, high-level waste from reprocessing in England must still be taken back and transferred to other interim storage facilities in Germany.

Why a return transport to Phillipsburg?

Until 2011, the waste holders transported the radioactive residues from reprocessing to the Gorleben interim storage facility in Lower Saxony. Since then, 108 containers with vitrified radioactive waste have been stored there, representing a large proportion of the total waste to be returned from reprocessing. Gorleben is also the only site that has been partially investigated in the past for its suitability as a repository for high-level radioactive waste. These geological investigations were abolished in 2012, and the site is no longer part of the search for a repository under the Site Selection Act.

With the Site Selection Act, which was passed by a large majority of the German Bundestag in 2013, the legislator also amended the Atomic Energy Act so that the remaining vitrified waste is to be stored abroad in interim storage facilities at the nuclear power plant sites. The aim was to avoid giving the impression that Gorleben had already been chosen as the site for a repository in the context of the open-ended search for a final repository. In 2015, the Federal Government, the Länder and the utilities agreed to store the remaining radioactive waste in Biblis, Brokdorf, Niederaichbach (Isar nuclear power plant) and Philippsburg.