The distant origin of all this is unclear and is typical of the time in which it was created. The Franco dictatorship decided to accumulate secretly in the sixties. radioactive waste In a disused uranium mine in the middle of the Córdoba mountains. First Spanish nuclear cemetery It was an uncontrolled, secret operation in which hundreds of barrels were stacked containing materials left over from tests carried out by the former Nuclear Energy Board (JEN). The scandal was not discovered until the early stages of democracy and was revealed thanks to a journalistic investigation.
The first solution offered was temporary, almost a patch. In the mid-eighties, three special modules (three industrial warehouses) were built, which transported more than 700 barrels containing radioactive waste stored in the old mine. The next step is the newly established National Radioactive Waste Company (Enresa) He undertook the construction of an entirely new nuclear waste repository – finally a modern and compatible facility – on the same land in the Cordoban Mountain Range, with the goal of being the definitive storage site for this facility forever.
At that time in 1992 El Cabril Storage CenterIn the middle of the Sierra Albarrana. Thirty years later, what started as a secret hideaway is now a International reference facility in the nuclear industry. Medium, low and very low radioactivity waste produced in Spain is stored here. mostly nuclear power plants (90% of the total waste it receives) and to a much lesser extent from hospitals, research centers or industries.
High levels of waste (mostly spent nuclear fuel used to generate electricity) will continue to accumulate for decades in the nuclear power plants themselvesuntil construction a huge, deep geological repository A project where they will be kept forever, but whose design and location have not yet been chosen and, in principle, are not expected to be operational until 2073.
The El Cabril nuclear repository is located in the north of Córdoba province, near where it meets the Seville and Badajoz depots. Located in the Cordoban foothills of the Sierra Morena, the large Spanish nuclear cemetery is far from the towns in the region. Hornachuelos, located within the municipal borders, is 40 kilometers away, and you need to travel similar distances to reach Peñarroya, Azuaga or Fuente Obejuna. Only some smaller towns are closer, about 20 kilometers away. All The centre’s facilities cover an area of approximately 35 hectares (equivalent to about 50 football fields at the popular exchange rate) but they are located within a huge rural estate of more than 1,100 hectares.
The location of the large warehouse does not seem ideal a prioriBecause it is far away from most of the Spanish nuclear power plants. The nearest facility is Almaraz in Cáceres, 250 kilometers away; but Ascó, Vandellós (both in Tarragona) or Garoña (in Burgos) are about 800 kilometers away, these are the places where the trucks carrying the waste must travel (El Cabril picks up and picks up)200 to 250 trucks every year to dump waste). It was clear at the time that hosting a nuclear cemetery was the most important thing. Andalusian solidarity quota with nuclear plan Spanish. Regions such as Catalonia, the Valencian Community, Extremadura and Castile hosted nuclear power plants, and Andalusia did so with its waste dumps.
More than 80 percent are already full
complex El Cabril has three storage platforms wastes: two for medium and low radioactivity wastes (RBMA) and the other for very low activity wastes (RBBA). The characteristics of each are completely different because the processes that need to be applied to different types of waste are also different. The medium- and low-activity platforms consist of dozens of massive concrete bays (cells), each housing 320 concrete containers that store barrels containing the waste. Center staff never come into contact with this material, it is always transported in closed containers and by machines and cranes directed from isolated control rooms.
The appearance of the platform for very low radioactivity waste, which did not become operational until 2008, is in the form of two large white plastic tents (similar to those found at any construction site), under which barrels and large bags of rubble are directly stacked. ), placed by truck cranes and which personnel can handle directly without any associated radiation dose. The space available for very low-level waste is far from being filled: two cells using only a quarter of their capacity are in operation (they currently contain just over 21,000 cubic meters of waste) and have a permit from the Enresa Nuclear Power Plant. The Security Council (CSN) will build two more cells.
The situation of available space for medium and low level waste is very different and this is what challenges the decision. One of the platforms (the largest, 16 cells) is already fully occupied. And the other (12-cell) has already filled more than half of its capacity: six cells are full and the other two are already working. Total, Almost 83% of the space allocated for this type of waste is currently used in the center (with more than 36,000 cubic meters of radioactive residue at the end of last June).
Future expansion
Faced with this situation, El Cabril is preparing to take it on. A macro expansion that will nearly double your storage capacityBuilding a new platform for medium and low activity waste with 27 new cells (to be added to the existing 28 cells). The aim is to provide the facilities with sufficient space to accommodate the new waste generated by the future dismantling of all Spanish nuclear power plants. Government and electricity companies agree on a timetable Phased closure of all reactors between 2027 and 2035It will produce thousands of tonnes of new radioactive waste that will need to be managed (in the next three years alone, El Cabril will receive around 2,000 tonnes from the dismantling of the old Garoña factory).
Enresa is awaiting the government’s final approval of the expansion project. An investment of 182 million euros is planned To implement this by matching all the investments accumulated in the center over the last forty years (183 million since 1985). Authorization is expected to be received from the Ministry of Ecological Transition next year, with the aim of the work to start in 2025 and some of the new facilities to be operational in 2028. El Cabril’s expansion plans call for a first phase of 12 new facilities. The cells, which will be operational in 2028, will then build 15 additional cells, and there is no specific deadline for these yet.
“The Sixth General Plan for Radioactive Waste, approved in 2006, envisaged the expansion and construction of new cells in the future. “Enresa’s technicians were already completely correct in their calculations that the existing facilities would be full in 2028 and would therefore need to be expanded.” José Luis Navarro, president of Enresa, Person who guided the facilities for a team from EL PERIÓDICO DE ESPAÑA. “With the new capacity to be obtained through expansion, it will be sufficient to remove all of the waste from the facility. Dismantling of Spanish nuclear power plants. Navarro predicts that waste from dismantling the facilities will continue to reach El Cabril until the 2050s.
Under surveillance for 300 years
The plan was always for all waste arriving at El Cabril to remain there permanently (Córdoba is the only definitive nuclear repository in central Spain). . The aim is to completely restore the mountain landscape so that after the dismantling of nuclear power plants, when the repository is full and the radioactive residues are no longer taken in large quantities, it is not noticed that there is a repository there. Tests to test how to do this will begin next year.
Enresa is awaiting approval from CSN for its pilot project, which will include one of the already completed cells. It will be covered with layers of drainage and waterproofing and a final layer of soil where native vegetation will be allowed to grow, and the company will study how the insulation develops over several years before committing to definitively lining entire warehouses.
Completing the landscape integration of existing storage facilities in the future and all structures buried. A monitoring and control phase will then begin, lasting 300 years for medium and low-level waste (the time during which they will retain their radioactivity) and approximately 60 years for very low-level waste.
But radiological control duties have been here to stay since storage was introduced three decades ago. Enresa develops: environmental radiological surveillance program Samples of fauna, flora and food produced in the area are analyzed by independent external laboratories with dosimeters placed within a few kilometers of the area, and the results are compared with samples taken before El Cabril started working to measure the evolution of radiation levels.
“A total of 1,077 samples will be taken this year. “Water, air, wild fauna, vegetation, samples of meat, milk, fish, honey from livestock farms…” he explains. Eva Noguero, manager of El Cabril storage centerHe emphasizes that the tests confirm the zero environmental impact of the landfill. “This year it has been difficult to complete all the necessary measurements. “There are almost no partridges in the area this year, and it took us three months to get all the minimal samples,” jokes Noguero, who boasts that almost 70% of the workers in the El Cabril workforce (there are currently 116 partridge employees) are originally from municipalities in the area. Director, He was born in Peñarroya, just 45 kilometers from the installations he commanded for more than a decade.
Source: Informacion
James Sean is a writer for “Social Bites”. He covers a wide range of topics, bringing the latest news and developments to his readers. With a keen sense of what’s important and a passion for writing, James delivers unique and insightful articles that keep his readers informed and engaged.