Decomission

Russian and international non-governmental organizations have their own opinion on the problem of RW and SNF disposal outlined in various documents. NGO members of the DECOMMISSION International Network have been analysing the experience of safe disposal of RW and SNF for over ten years.
This analysis is based on the official printed state documents and positions of the NGOs – members of the DECOMMISSION International Network.
The authors of this report would like to express their appreciation to Oleg E. Muratov, member of the Public Council of Rosatom, for his valuable observations and comments, many of which were included.
To read the booklet you can here.

One of the areas of state policy in the sphere of radioactive waste and spent nuclear fuel management is provision of environmental safety for the population. On the basis of general legal principles the state policy of Russia in the sphere of radioactive waste (RW) and spent nuclear fuel (SNF) management should not contradict the fundamental rights and legitimate interests of its citizens. The right to favourable environment, ecological and radiation safety, sustainable use of natural resources belongs both to the current and future generations. These rights are legally important and they must determine the essence of adopted normative acts. For this purpose the state policy of RW and SNF management cannot contradict the national environmental policy.

One of the biggest secrets in the Soviet society was its closed towns. Some of them were well known, but others were so secret that they did not seem to exist. Existing towns that were turned into a closedtown ceased to exist on maps. In other places big towns grew up without any trace on maps or any other official records. Very few except those who lived there knew about their existence. Often they were known to the outside world only by their postcode, for example Krasnoyarsk-26, which stands for Zheleznogorsk.
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This report is written with invaluable help from Naturvernforbundet’s Russian partners. It has been a challenge to finalize the work, as new organizations have been labelled Foreign Agents constantly, and as there is a constant flow of new information, news articles and analyses regarding the Foreign Agent law, and also on the law on Undesirable Organizations. Deadline for our collection of information was set on December 2nd 2015, when our partner organization Green World was formally listed as Foreign Agent in the register of the Ministry of Justice. We express our gratitude to the Ministry of Climate and Environment as well as to the Norwegian Radiation Protection Authority. Their support enables Naturvernforbundet to follow the situation around the civil society development in Russia, and help us make the information we have public.
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On November 16th 2015, at 13:15 in the nuclear town Sosnovyj Bor on the Baltic Sea coast, 40 km from the St. Petersburg, representatives of the Leningrad Region Department of the Ministry of Justice of Russian Federation handed the environmental Non Governmental Organization (NGO) Green World (GW) an Act on the results of an unscheduled on-site inspection of the organization.

Baltic Newsletter #125

The Committee of Ecology of the Parliamentary Association of the Northwest of Russia
approved at its meeting in St. Petersburg on November 2, 2015 the composition of its Working Group to prepare proposals for the consideration of interests of regions impacted by decommissioning of nuclear power plants.

The final halt and decommissioning of the world's oldest RBMK-1000 at the Leningrad Nuclear Power Plant (LNPP) is planned for 2018. The oldest operating power units with VVER-440 nuclear power plants at the Kola NPP, the same age as LAES, will be decommissioned in the future in the Murmansk region. The Northwest Federal District of Russia will be the first to solve the complex problems associated with the decommissioning of energy units, final disposal of radioactive waste and spent nuclear fuel (SNF). The experience in solving the complex problems of the decommissioning of these nuclear power plants can be replicated in other federal districts of Russia and in other countries.

Baltic newsletter # 124

On March 19 in St. Petersburg, the Standing Committee on Ecology of the Parliamentary Association of the Northwest of Russia held a regular meeting of the heads of environmental committees (commissions) of legislative bodies of the Northwest of Russia.

The model of cooperation between authorities, nuclear industry and public discussed in St. Petersburg in the frame of International Round Table Discussion, March 12.
There are participated the representatives of the authorities, nuclear industry, scientists and public from Russia, USA. After the discussion, the participants adopted the resolution with the recommendations to all stakeholders of the decision making process of the nuclear facilities.

The cooperating organizations in the Decommissioning Network have as their main goal to convince the Russian government to start the decommission process of the oldest and most dangerous nuclear power plants. The present official Russian policy is to expand the number of nuclear power stations with new constructions and giving the existing old nuclear reactors lifetime extensions beyond their design life-time limit. This is working contrary to the goal of our project.