What will become of Asse?

Date

21/10/2011

To rule out hazards for man and environment today and also in the far future, the Federal Office for Radiation Protection (BfS) has been preparing the decommissioning of the Asse repository in compliance with the standards of nuclear law. On its way to achieving this aim, the BfS had investigated three different options how the Asse II mine could be safely decommissioned.

One option was to retrieve the waste from the mine and to store it elsewhere. Another option provided for creating new cavities in a deeper part of the salt dome and relocating the waste to this area. The third option consisted of completely backfilling the cavities in the mine with concrete.

The BfS published the result of the evaluation in January 2010: According to the present state of knowledge, retrieving all the waste from the Asse II mine is the best variant of how to further deal with the radioactive waste emplaced. According to the current state of knowledge the long-term safety can only be ensured for the Asse site after all the waste has been retrieved. The decision was taken with the participation of the general public in a comprehensible procedure whose outcome is not known.

There are still uncertainties regarding the state of the emplacement chambers and the radioactive waste as well as the radiation exposure to the staff while the waste is being retrieved. Therefore, an in-depth finding of facts is initially taking place in emplacement chambers 7 and 12 on the 750-m level in the scope of the trial phase (fact finding).

The selected decommissioning option must then be licensed in a plan-approval procedure by the competent authority, the Lower Saxony Ministry for the Environment and Climate Protection. The BfS has to provide comprehensive evidence about the safety of the selected decommissioning option.