On July 8, the industrial operation of the Liquid Radioactive Waste Treatment Plant (LRTP) was resumed. For a week of operation in this mode, 34 packages of end product were prepared at the plant. After 28 days of holding, the RAW packages will be transferred for disposal at the engineered near-surface disposal facility for solid radioactive waste.
The start of producing the end product became available since the LRTP received the cement of required brand manufactured by Ukrainian enterprise “Dniprotsement”. It had passed pre-testing and meets the required process conditions completely.
On July 4, the first batch of cement (50 tones) was delivered to the industrial site of ChNPP. The batch passed receiving inspection, and already on July 8, the processing line at LRTP was launched and immobilization of the evaporated concentrate was started.
As Mr. Oleksandr Skomarokhov, the Deputy Technical Director for RAW Management, emphasized, the proficiency maintaining program was prepared prior to commencement of immobilization in order to minimize potential errors of personnel and check operability of the whole plant. According to his words, the week of pilot operation proved that both equipment and personnel work well.
During the first half-year period of industrial operation of LRTP, it is planned to reach a production capacity at the quantity of up to 10 RAW packages per 24 hours.
FYI
A separate permission for LRTP operation was granted in December 2014. Prior to that, all necessary tests of LRTP have been carried out. According to the separate permission of SNRIU for LRTP operation, a condition to start operation of the plant was to obtain a certificate of the State Architectural and Construction Inspectorate (SACI) affirming the facility completion.
Due to introduction of new construction codes and regulations in 2014, obtaining a certificate had been delaying till reconstruction of the plant in accordance with new requirements. Pursuant to the updating design, the actions regarding improvement of fire safety, lightning protection, and heat insulation have been implemented at LRTP. Additionally, the self-supporting electric boilers and steam generator were installed at the facility that would enable to evaporate RAW and finally reduce its quantity due to increase of salt content in RAW.
All basic actions specified in the updating design were executed, and on March 20, 2018, the Chornobyl NPP obtained the SACI’s certificate.
Till 2018, 63 RAW packages were produced at LRTP. However, due to a necessity to improve the composition of cement matrix, the activities were temporarily suspended.
During 2018-2019, the alkali cement had been searching which is necessary for technological process execution.
