noted in 2021, but EDF has now put in place a special organisation for addressing the deviations affecting these equipment items. Concerning labour inspection, ASN considers that the site’s accident results are satisfactory, despite the very intense programme of activities in 2021. Improvements are nevertheless expected in the licensee’s control of risks associated with work at height and chemicals. Reactor 1 undergoing decommissioning Bugey 1 is a GCR. This first-generation reactor functioned with natural uranium as the fuel, graphite as the moderator and it was cooled by gas. The Bugey 1 reactor is an “integrated” GCR, whose heat exchangers are situated inside the reactor vessel beneath the reactor core. In March 2016, in view of the technical difficulties encountered, EDF announced a complete change of decommissioning strategy for its def initively shut down reactors. In this new strategy, the planned decommissioning scenario for all the reactor pressure vessels involves decommissioning “in air” rather than “under water” as initially envisaged. Through ASN Chairman’s resolution CODEP-CLG-2020-021253 of 3 March 2020, further to the change in EDF’s decommissioning strategy, ASN requires EDF to complete the decommissioning operations on the building and equipment that are not necessary for decommissioning of the reactor pressure vessel by 2024 at the latest. In 2020, ASN authorised the creation of a new effluents storage facility at the Bugey 1 reactor to replace the old station, which will be put out of service, decommissioned and cleaned out. ASN considers that the Bugey 1 reactor decommissioning and vessel characterisation operations are proceeding with a satisfactory level of safety. The licensee ensures rigorous monitoring of the equipment and the ongoing decommissioning works. After analysing the periodic safety review concluding report for the GCRs, ASN stated in December 2021 that it had no objection to continuing the decommissioning of this reactor. Activated waste packaging and interim storage installation The Activated waste packaging and interim storage facility (Iceda), which constitutes BNI 173, is intended for the packaging and storage of various categories of radioactive waste on the Bugey site (in the Ain département). It is designed for the reception, packaging and interim storage of: • low-level, long-lived (LLW-LL) graphite waste from the dismantling of the Bugey 1 reactor, which is destined –after interim storage– for near-surface disposal in a facility whose concept is still being studied; • activated metallic intermediate-level, long-lived waste (ILW-LL) from the operation of the in-service power plants, for example parts which have spent time near the reactor core, such as control rod clusters, destined for deep geological disposal after interim storage; THE INSTALLATIONS AND ACTIVITIES TO REGULATE COMPRISE: ཛྷ Nuclear Power Plants operated by EDF: • Bugey (4 reactors of 900 MWe), • Cruas-Meysse (4 reactors of 900 MWe), • Saint-Alban (2 reactors of 1,300 MWe), • Tricastin (4 reactors of 900 MWe); ཛྷ the nuclear fuel fabrication plants operated by Framatome in Romans‑sur‑Isère; ཛྷ the “nuclear fuel cycle” plants operated by Orano on the Tricastin industrial platform; ཛྷ the Operational Hot Unit (BCOT) at Tricastin operated by EDF; ཛྷ The High Flux Reactor (RHF) operated by the Laue-Langevin Institute in Grenoble; ཛྷ the Activated waste packaging and storage facility (Iceda) on the Bugey nuclear site and the Bugey Inter-Regional Warehouse (MIR) for fuel storage, operated by EDF; ཛྷ reactor 1 undergoing decommissioning at the Bugey NPP operated by EDF; ཛྷ the Superphénix reactor undergoing decommissioning at Creys-Malville and its auxiliary installations, operated by EDF; ཛྷ the Ionisos irradiator in Dagneux; ཛྷ the Effluents and Solid waste Treatment and decay storage Station (STED) of the CEA in Grenoble, which is waiting to be delicensed following decommissioning; ཛྷ the CERN international research centre located on the Swiss-French border; ཛྷ small-scale nuclear activities in the medical sector: • 22 external-beam radiotherapy departments, • 6 brachytherapy departments, • 23 nuclear medicine departments, • 121 facilities using fluoroscopy-guided interventional practices, • 154 scanners within 115 facilities, • some 10,000 medical and dental radiology devices; ཛྷ small-scale nuclear activities in the veterinary, industrial and research sectors: • 1 synchrotron, • about 700 veterinary practices (surgeries or clinics), • 35 industrial radiology agencies, • about 600 users of industrial equipment, • about 70 public or private research units; ཛྷ activities associated with the transport of radioactive substances; ཛྷ ASN-approved laboratories and organisations: • 3 organisations and 7 agencies approved for radiation protection controls. ABSTRACTS – ASN Report on the state of nuclear safety and radiation protection in France in 2021 41 REGIONAL OVERVIEW OF NUCLEAR SAFETY AND RADIATION PROTECTION AUVERGNE-RHÔNE-ALPES
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