Supercompaction (including HEPA filter and asbestos compaction)

Actinide waste treatment and disposal

Tritiated waste

• Service operated since 1989, over 60,000 drums processed.
• Customers include UKAEA, AWE, British Energy, BNG, Amersham, DML, Slovenske Electrarne and KernKraftwerk Leibstadt AG.
• New unit commissioned autumn 1999.

• Characterisation, storage and disposal of 70 tonnes of DU swarf for AWE.
• Development of treatment methods for Pu salts, UF4 and UF6 for AWE.
• Processing of thoria catalyst for ICI.
• Processing and disposal of uranium wastes for UKAEA.
• Disposal of uranium and thorium compounds for small users.

• Decontamination and disposal of tritiated material.
• Characterisation, processing and disposal of tritiated wastes for JET.

• Services for supercompaction of contaminated asbestos and HEPA filters are provided, in addition to conventional LLW.
• Other waste types will be considered.· Unit usually operated at Winfrith but is mobile if necessary.
• Transfer authorisations are needed to move waste to Winfrith.

• WMT has extensive actinide handling facilities and experience at Winfrith.
• WMT has its own current Drigg allocation of 500 MBq/yr. Alpha, allowing LLW disposal of small (tens of kg) quantities of uranium and thorium.
• Access to MBGW store at Sellafield through Windscale facilities.

• Extensive tritium handling facilities at Winfrith.
• Large discharge authorisations for gaseous and liquid tritium from Winfrith site.
• Existing tritium workers and monitored facilities.
• On site analytical support.

• Semi-manual operation allows for better waste packing than fully automatic and therefore higher overall volume reduction. (lower disposal costs).
• Waste Management Technology accepts a wider range of waste types than WAMAC.

• Opportunity to discharge liability for some wastes.
• Use of WMT facilities and expertise avoids interference with customer’s routine site operations.
• Existing discharge and waste transfer authorisations sufficient to allow development work and many operations.

• Opportunity to convert ILW to LLW for some wastes.
• Option of tritium recycling where this is identified as BPEO.
• Secondary processing wastes can be easily dealt with.