ALZENAU, Germany and CHERNOBYL, Ukraine, December 19 /PRNewswire/ -- NUKEM Technologies GmbH, Alzenau has handed over the Engineered Near Surface Disposal Facility at Chernobyl to the customer SSE Technocenter on 19 December 2007. By doing so, NUKEM as the first Western company, has successfully completed a plant for the treatment of radioactive waste on location Chernobyl up to the handover to the customer.

In the Engineered Near Surface Disposal Facility, short-life radioactive wastes accumulated in the nuclear power plant Chernobyl are stored following prior conditioning. The repository is situated 17 kilometres away from the power plant at the location VEKTOR within the 30-km zone.

The repository consists of two parallel rows of modular storage segments with mobile service facilities for the loading and covering of the storage segments as well as various systems for the radiological control and additional auxiliary systems. Concrete containers as waste containers are provided for the conditioned solid wastes and 200-litre drums for the conditioned liquid wastes. The storage capacity has been designed for 55,000 m3 of treated waste. (55,000 m3 capacity corresponds to a cuboid just under eight metres high of the size of an international standard football field). The storage time is designed for 300 years, after this time the radioactivity of the wastes has decayed to such an extent that no control is required any longer. The construction of the repository largely corresponds to that of the surface-near repository El Cabril in Spain.

The Engineered Near Surface Disposal Facility is part of the ICSRM project within the scope of which NUKEM erects a waste treatment centre for the conditioning of solid radioactive wastes on an industrial scale in Chernobyl. Plant components such as removal and conditioning facilities will be handed over to the customer next year. After an international tendering process, NUKEM was commissioned to carry out the turnkey construction of these plants in 2001, the project is financed by the EU within the framework of the TACIS program.

NUKEM Technologies GmbH, Alzenau, renders services for the nuclear industry worldwide. The main activities are the management of radioactive wastes, shutting down of nuclear facilities and engineering and consulting. The parent company NUKEM GmbH is one of the largest suppliers worldwide of nuclear fuel services and generated a turnover of 565 million Euros in the financial year 2006.

Contact: NUKEM Technologies GmbH, Beate Scheffler, T: +49(0)6023-91-11-47, Email: beate.scheffler@nukem.de.

Contact: NUKEM Technologies GmbH, Beate Scheffler, T: +49(0)6023-91-11-47, Email: beate.scheffler@nukem.de.