Technical Support for decommissioning of heavy water reactor of ITEPh Moscow, management of radwaste, contaminated heavy water & remediation of reactor building territory

R4.02/05 - Technical Support for decommissioning of the heavy water reactor of ITEPh Moscow, management of radwaste, contaminated heavy water and remediation of reactor building territory including on-site radiation monitoring system

Decommissioning of obsolete nuclear facilities near the centre of Moscow is for Russia a priority with the goal of achieving a green field status. The AIDCO nuclear safety strategy comprised cooperation with the Regulator on enhanced capabilities for regulating, licensing and inspecting decommissioning projects including research installations. Supporting the Operator of the ITEP heavy water research reactor under decommissioning duly complemented this strategy. Moreover, the ITEP reactor was topic for a 1996 US-Russian intervention to safeguard the high enriched uranium fuel present at that time.

The Supply project had a close relation with TACIS project RF/TS/50 (a part of the larger project R3.01/05) which supported the regulatory review of the licensing documents on decommissioning the ITEP heavy water reactor. The review was to raise the scope and quality of among others the Safety Analysis Report to international accepted practices. The equipment supply provided the technological basis for matching the high targets of introduced European best practices.

The State Scientific Center of Russian Federation "Institute of Theoretical and Experimental Physics" (ITEP) possessed a Heavy Water Reactor (HWR) which was centrally located in Moscow, about eight kilometers south of the City center. This reactor, of 2.5 MW power, was shut down in 1987 after 37 years of operation by an Order of the Russian Ministry of Atomic Energy (Minatom). The HWR decommissioning started in 1987 and the spent fuel from the reactor core and from the spent fuel storage pond was removed and transported to the reprocessing plant "Mayak". In 1997, the Russian nuclear regulatory body, RF Gosatomnadzor, approved the Decommissioning Programme developed by the ITEP experts. In 1999, a licence for the decommissioning of the HWR reactor was granted to ITEP by RF Gosatomnadzor and the practical decommissioning activities were started. By the middle of 2002 it was estimated that about 80% of the decommissioning work was finished.

This TACIS project intended to support the implementation of remaining decommissioning tasks on the Heavy Water Reactor at ITEP by supplying the equipment necessary for further safe decomissioning. The project should supply equipment to support the first of three planned remaining stages of the decommissioning. The scope of supply was based upon the report prepared by ITEP.

The tender is a part of a larger effort to provide the wherewithal necessary for the decommissioning that included also project R4.02/05 B.

The project provided the following major equipment and miscellaneous items:

• Part A: Radiation protection equipment including:
  • 50 Personal dosimeters (TLD) and 15 Personal alarm dosimeters
  • 2 Reading devices for TLD (Thermo-luminescent Dosimeters)
  • 1 Whole body contamination monitor
  • 2 Workplace aerosol monitors
  • 1 Containment tent
  • 2 Portable surface contamination monitors
  • 15 Full air work suits of various types
  • 8 Face breathing sets
• Part B: Process control and waste characterization equipment; comprising as major equipment
  • 2 Portable gamma spectrometers with Na(Tl) detectors
  • 2 Alpha-beta counting systems
  • 1 Laboratory gamma spectrometer with pure germanium detector and X-ray spectroscopy system
  • 1 Laboratory alpha spectrometric system for multi-sample measurement
  • 1 Laboratory liquid scintillation system
  • Laboratory equipment for sample preparation for radiochemical measurement
  • 1 FT-IR spectrometer
  • 1 Analytical balance
  • 1 Densitometer

The Acceptance Certificates were signed in September 2010. The results of the project include:

1. the radiochemical laboratory is equipped in the renovated premises,
2. the supplier trained two groups (total 12 specialists) on spectroscopic measurements and radiochemical analyses with the new equipment,
3. warranty and after-sales services covered repair of the defective power supplies of 8 computers, reinstalling the operating system and 'russification' of the keyboards.