POWER March 2022 - 11

GLOBAL MONITOR
3. This photo montage shows the final deep
geological repository for 12,000 tonnes of
spent nuclear fuel in Forsmark, in Sweden.
The total length of the tunnel system is more
than 60 kilometers. Below ground, the repository
covers three to four square kilometers at
a depth of 500 meters. Courtesy: SKB
OKG (22%), and Sydkraft Nuclear Power
(12%). In a statement to POWER in January,
SKB Managing Director Johan Dasht
hailed the project as a potentially pioneering
opportunity for the long-standing
SNF disposal issue. " For SKB, the decision
further strengthens our position as
a world leader in this area, " he said.
According to Washington, D.C.-based
Stimson Center, a nonprofit committed
to international security, and which painstakingly
monitors global SNF disposal, of
21 countries that have significant nuclear
power activities and spent fuel management
policies, five countries-Canada,
Finland, France, Sweden, and Switzerland-are
the most advanced " in moving
forward with deep geological disposal in
the next decades. " Still, Finland is notably
the only country already building a DGR,
kicking off construction of its Onkalo facility
in Olkiluoto (Figure 4), off the southwestern
coast of Finland in 2016. Finland
expects to begin operating the facility in
2025. Onkalo, too, will use SKB's KBS-3
disposal concept to store SNF up to 450
meters underground at a site that was
chosen by Posiva, SKB's Finnish counterpart,
and licensed in 2015-marking
the first time a construction license for a
geological disposal facility was received
anywhere in the world.
Posiva, which in late December submitted
an operating license for its integrated
DGR and encapsulation facility,
in January notably announced that it is
readying to conduct a trial run of final disposal
(TRFD) in 2023. " The TRFD comprises
the whole disposal process with
final disposal systems and machinery,
organisation and procedures, but will
be performed with dummy fuel assemblies, "
the company told POWER.
Tiina Jalonen, senior vice president
of Development for Posiva suggested
the key to development of final disposal
" is the long-term safety of the solution, "
which must be " assessed and demonstrated
with the safety case. " The safety
case encapsulates every aspect of investigation,
including all technological and
scientific materials, analyses, observations,
trials, tests, and other proof used to
justify the reliability of the assessments
made of the long-term safety of final disposal.
" The more than four decades of research
work is transformed into a detailed
description of the geological final disposal
solution, analysing different evolutionary
paths and demonstrating the safety of final
disposal in the conditions of Olkiluoto
bedrock, " she said.
According to the Stimson Center, like
Finland and Sweden, Canada, France, and
Switzerland are making headway in this
respect. In France, radioactive waste management
agency Andra is currently preparing
a license application, and in Canada
and Switzerland national waste management
agencies are investigating appropriate
sites through site characterization.
As of 2021, meanwhile, nine countries-Belgium,
Czech Republic, Finland,
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POWER March 2022

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