ASN Report 2020

Dampierre‑en‑Burly nuclear power plant The Dampierre-en-Burly NPP is situated on the right bank of the Loire river, in the Loiret département , about 10 km downstream of the town of Gien and 45 km upstream of Orléans. It comprises four 900 MWe nuclear reactors which were commissioned in 1980 and 1981. Reactors 1 and 2 constitute BNI 84, and reactors 3 and 4 BNI 85. The site accommodates one of the regional bases of the Nuclear Rapid Intervention Force (FARN), the special emergency response force created by EDF in 2011 following the Fukushima Daiichi NPP accident. Its role is to intervene in pre-accident or accident situations, on any NPP in France, by providing additional human resources and emergency equipment. ASN considers that the nuclear safety performance of the Dampierre-en-Burly NPP is in line with its general assessment of the EDF plants, even if the level of safety of the site has dropped compared with 2019. Environmental and radiation protection performance, for their part, remain below the national average. As far as nuclear safety is concerned, performance in normal operational control is acceptable on the whole and progress in the configuring of systems is to be underlined. On the other hand, organisational deficiencies relating to skills, the training of operating staff and the management of the periodic tests of safety-important components led to several signif icant event reports during 2020. With regard to maintenance of the facilities, ASN notes that the corrective actions conducted by the site are still insufficient, particularly concerning equipment conformity and compliance with the applicable baseline requirements, since numerous deviations are detected during inspections on these subjects and in the context of reactor outage monitoring. Moreover, and for several years now, the control of the fire and explosion risks is not entirely satisfactory. The radiation protection performance of the Dampierre- en‑Burly NPP is still clearly inadequate, particularly with regard to the control of radiological cleanliness and the dispersion of contamination on worksites in controlled areas. A plan of rigour was put in place on the site in 2017, but did not produce the expected results. Given this situation, ASN will maintain targeted monitoring of the site’s radiation protection in 2021. Lastly, the environmental protection performance of the Dampierre‑en‑Burly NPP must be improved. Although the discharge limits for gaseous and liquid effluents are observed on the whole, the licensee must rapidly undertake corrective actions regarding management of the Legionella risk (given the exceeding of limit values observed in 2020), management of waste and management of hazardous substance containment. With regard to labour inspection, the site must now put in place plans to remedy the nonconformities detected further to last year’s actions in the electrical field. Lastly, the licensee is also expected to take action in response to the f indings made during the inspections conducted in the buildings of the Ultimate Diesel Generator (DUS) commissioned in 2020. In the context of the Covid‑19 pandemic, various inspections concerning management of the health crisis were carried out on documents and in the field. The observations addressed to the NPP and to the subcontractor companies resulted in corrective actions. THE INSTALLATIONS AND ACTIVITIES TO REGULATE COMPRISES: Basic Nuclear Installations: • the Belleville‑sur‑Loire NPP (2 reactors of 1,300 MWe), • the Dampierre‑en‑Burly NPP (4 reactors of 900 MWe), • the Saint‑Laurent‑des‑Eaux site: the NPP in operation (2 reactors of 900 MWe), and the 2 French Gas-Cooled Reactors (GCRs) undergoing decommissioning and the irradiated graphite sleeve storage silos, • the Chinon site: the NPP in operation (4 reactors of 900 MWe), the 3 French GCRs undergoing decommissioning, the Irradiated Material Facility (AMI) and the Inter-Regional Fuel Warehouse (MIR) for fresh fuel; small-scale nuclear activities in the medical sector: • 8 external-beam radiotherapy departments, • 3 brachytherapy departments, • 11 nuclear medicine departments, • 32 centres using fluoroscopy-guided interventional procedures, • 38 computed tomography scanners, • some 2,700 medical and dental radiology devices; small-scale nuclear activities in the veterinary, industrial and research sectors: • 10 industrial radiography companies, • about 330 industrial, veterinary and research radiography devices; activities associated with the transport of radioactive substances; ASN-approved laboratories and organisations: • 2 organisations approved for radiation protection controls, • 4 laboratories approved for taking environmental radioactivity measurements. p. 206 p. 238 p. 266 ASN Report on the state of nuclear safety and radiation protection in France in 2020 53 REGIONAL OVERVIEWOF NUCLEAR SAFETY AND RADIATION PROTECTION CENTRE-VAL DE LOIRE