A Waste Management Facility (WMF) is a plant for the treatment and conditioning of radioactive waste resulting from previous site operations and decommissioning procedures.
This plant will treat solid waste of Saluggia site and transform it to a final product that complies both with storage requirements for the National Repository and the temporary repositories of the site.
Two different procedures will be carried out in the plant: cutting/reduction in size and characterisation.
The first is intended for ILW (Intermediate Level Waste); the second, for LLW (Low Level Waste) and VLLW (Very Low-Level Waste). In addition to this, large components made of different materials (mostly concrete and steel) will be also treated.
Among the difficulties connected to the plant implementation there are: a non-linear lay-out flow in the process, due to the narrowness of the plant spaces and premises; different types of waste which require adopting specific waste handling and processing techniques; the need to carry out remote operations due to high radioactivity levels and high waste quantities.
A preliminary study is now under development. The total estimated duration of the project is approx. 6 years.