ASN Report 2020

As far as maintenance is concerned, given the context of sustained activity on account of the ten-yearly outage of reactor 2, ASN considers that the situation is on the whole satisfactory. The licensee must nevertheless continue its efforts in the monitoring of work interventions, primarily to better detect the nonconformities that make further interventions on the facilities necessary. This is because such nonconformities remain frequent. As far as occupational radiation protection is concerned, the results at the end of the ten-yearly outage of reactor 2 are disappointing. The lack of control of the radiological cleanliness of certain worksites has effectively led to a large number of internal exposures of workers. Improvements in the coordination of work interventions are required. The modifications to protective measures while worksites are in progress must moreover be better formalised and tracked. With regard to environmental protection, ASN considers that the site’s results for 2020 are satisfactory. ASN notes an improvement in the control of discharges in particular, despite a context constrained by the works of the ten-yearly outage of reactor 2. With respect to labour inspection, ASN was attentive to the adaptations of the safety instructions linked to the Covid‑19 pandemic, and to compliance with them. In addition, the inspections focusing on lifting operations underlined areas lacking rigour, including in the verif ication of equipment conformity before use. Aube waste disposal facility Authorised by a Decree of 4 September 1989 and com­ missioned in January 1992, the Aube repository (CSA) took over from the Manche repository which ceased its activities in July 1994, while benefiting from the experience gained with the latter. This facility, situated in Soulaines-Dhuys, has a disposal capacity of one million cubic metres (m 3 ) of low and intermediate level, short lived waste (LL/ILW-SL). It constitutes BNI 149. The operations authorised in the facility include the packaging of waste, either by injecting mortar into metal containers of 5 or 10 m 3 volume, or by compacting 200-litre drums. At the end of 2020, the volume of waste in the facility had reached about 350,000 m 3 , or 35% of the authorised capacity. According to the estimates made by Andra in 2016 in the concluding report on the CSA periodic safety review, the CSA could be completely filled by 2062 rather than 2042 as initially forecast, this estimate being based on better knowledge of the future waste and the waste delivery schedules. The year 2020 was marked by a prolonged shutdown of the centre’s facilities on account of the national health context. The construction of new disposal structures for the future waste continued elsewhere. ASN considers that the CSA is operated under satisfactory conditions in the areas of safety, radiation protection and environmental protection. The examination of the CSA’s periodic safety review report, intended in particular to assess the safety of the facility according to the planned development of its activities over the next ten years, continued in 2020, with a view to ASN making a position statement on the conditions of operation of the centre. Deep geological disposal project ASN considers that the scientif ic experiments and work conducted by Andra in the underground laboratory at Bure continued in 2020 with a good standard of quality, comparable with that of the preceding years. ASN Report on the state of nuclear safety and radiation protection in France in 2020 63 REGIONAL OVERVIEWOF NUCLEAR SAFETY AND RADIATION PROTECTION GRAND EST