In order to follow up on the activities related to i-graphite management, the IAEA has launched two more projects: establishing a repository for data and reports within the IMMONET knowledge network (accessible via the IAEA "Nucleus" portal) and a new project called Irradiated Graphite Processing Approaches (GRAPA) in which experts from the following countries participate: Belgium, France, Germany, India, Italy, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, Lithuania, the Netherlands, the Russian Federation, Spain, Switzerland, Ukraine, the United Kingdom, and the United States of America.
Reproduced from with permission.Īn initiative to select the optimum method for the disposal of radioactive waste graphite started in the frame of the IAEA conference Solutions for Graphite Waste: A Contribution to the Accelerated Decommissioning of Graphite-Moderated Nuclear Reactors (Manchester, UK, 2007) and the presented papers along with records of the discussion sessions may be found in IAEA-TECDOC-1647, published in 2010. Forecasted dynamics of collecting radioactive graphite waste in Russia. The increasing trend of global graphite reserves can also be seen from the data published by Pavlyuk ( Figure 2) : in Russia, from 2010–2020, the total amount of radioactive graphite waste increased by about 15,000 tons, and it is expected to reach roughly 60,000 tons in 2030.įigure 2. World resources of irradiated graphite waste by country (tons). The resources of several other countries range from 6000 to 2000 tons each.įigure 1. Handling i-graphite and i-carbon poses a particularly large problem for Great Britain (containing about 86,000 tons of i-carbons), the Russian Federation (60,000 tons), the USA (55,000 tons), and France (over 23,000 tons) ( Figure 1). According to data published in 2010 by the IAEA, the world resources of i-graphite at that time were approximately 250,000 tons (160,000 cubic meters). It has been estimated that as a result of the decommissioning of one water-cooled graphite-moderated reactor, about 1500–2000 tons of radioactive graphite waste is produced. Much of the waste comes from the dismantling of nuclear installations, which are the main source of the irradiated graphite (called i-graphite) originating from the reactor's structural material, as well as from other irradiated carbonaceous (i-carbonaceous) waste, non-graphitized carbon bricks, or fuel coatings (pyrocarbon, silicon carbide). Over 98% of this is classified as waste with a very low or low radioactivity level, and the majority of the remaining waste is at an intermediate level.
According to the recent data published by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the global volume of solid radioactive waste is about 35 million m 3, of which 28.5 million m 3 (82%) has been permanently disposed of, and another 6.3 million m 3 (18%) is in storage awaiting final disposal. Like any other industry, nuclear power plants (NPP) generate waste however, compared with other industries, the mass of this waste is relatively small.
Most of the reactors use moderators and/or reflectors made from graphite. At the turn of the millennium, scientists from several centers around the world started working on the development of new nuclear energy systems, called Generation IV systems, that will deliver energy at a relatively low cost and will work with a high level of safety. Fifty-five reactors, with a net capacity of 57,441 MWe, were under construction, while 172 reactors were permanently shut down. As of December 31, 2018, 451 nuclear power reactors were in operation and produced 392,779 MWe of electricity.