Most short-lived (less than 30 years) intermediate and low level waste is sent for final disposal to the surface waste repositories owned by the ANDRA (National Agency for Radioactive Waste Management).

These repositories operate on a principle whereby waste is confined and sheltered from hazards, notably water circulation, during what is known as a surveillance period, fixed by convention to last 300 years, until such time as their activity level has become negligible. There are two such repositories in France.

Surface or subsurface storage projects are being defined for other types of low-level waste.

The Manche waste repository, with its 530,000 m3 capacity, was set up in 1969 at Digueville and operated until July 1994. The final covering (leaktight and grass-covered), to protect the structures containing the waste against all water infiltration, was completed in June 1997. The localised settling of this covering layer detected in September 1999 would not appear to have worsened significantly since. However, this aspect remains under close surveillance.

In September 1998 the ANDRA submitted a request, completed in 1999, for authorisation to enter the surveillance period, which takes account of the recommendations of the Turpin Commission tasked by the government in 1996 with issuing an opinion on the environmental impact of the repository. The safety documents submitted to the ASN to back up this request were formally approved by the ASN in January 1999.

At the request of the ASN, the ANDRA also submitted, in December 1997, a discharge licence application, revised in 1999.

The ASN, jointly with the various ministerial departments concerned and taking into account the recommendations of the public inquiry committee, then prepared a draft authorisation to enter the surveillance period, amending the initial authorisation decree issued in 1969, together with a draft discharge licence. The regulations were published in the Official Gazette in January 2003.

As soon as the surveillance period decree was published, the ASN asked the ANDRA to begin to look at the future of the covering layer and the separation network designed to collect water that had penetrated the repository. The future of the covering layer should be the subject of a report into the benefits to be gained from installing a new and more durable cover, no later than 2009. In 2003, the ASN also authorised the ANDRA to modify the separation network so that it could be resized to take account of the throughput of effluent during the surveillance period. In 2004, ANDRA sent the ASN the surveillance phase safety report, which is currently being reviewed.

The low and intermediate level short-lived waste (LL-ILW-SL) repository

The low and intermediate level waste (LL-IL) repository, which until 2005 was known as the Aube repository, was created in 1989. It is located on the communes of Soulaines-Dhuys and La Ville-aux-Bois in the Aube département. It covers a surface area of about one hundred hectares.

Since 1992, this Centre has taken over from the Manche repository. Its design has benefited extensively from feedback relating to the construction and operation of the former plant.

The reduction at source in the volume of waste produced by nuclear licensees and the ramp-up of the CENTRACO facility means that the continued operation of this centre for several more decades can be envisaged.

The waste packages are stored in concrete structures connected to a drainage network for possible water infiltration (separate free-falling subsurface system), which is permanently monitored. The site capacity is 1,000,000 cubic metres of waste packages, entailing about 400 structures.

In addition to the disposal structures, the repository also has a waste packaging facility in which 2 types of operations are carried out: compacting of 200 litre drums in a 1000 ton press and grouting of the 5 or 10 m3 metal drums containing waste.

In 2001, the ANDRA was authorised by the ASN to accept for storage 55 EDF reactor vessel heads which had been replaced. The construction of the structures designed to take the vessel heads began in 2003. The first vessel heads were stored in 2005. The LL-IL waste repository currently contains 9 vessel heads.

In December 1999, the ASN authorised the ANDRA to use the Aube waste repository to store sealed radioactive sources from the CEA, with a half-life of less than that of cobalt 60. In January 2002, the ANDRA submitted an application for generic acceptance of radioactive sources meeting certain criteria, justified by a safety analysis based on the principles of RFS III.2.e. In 2004, the ASN gave the ANDRA authorisation in principle, although this did require that additional information be forwarded, in particular with respect to the packaging of used sealed sources. This additional information was provided by ANDRA in 2005 and the ASN authorised disposal of certain sources (radioactive half-life of less than 30 years, compliance with activity limits per source and per package).

In June 2002, the ANDRA sent the ministers in charge of nuclear safety an application to modify the authorisation decree of the LL-IL waste repository and a discharge licence application for this repository, to bring it into conformity with the provisions of the Environment code and its implementing decrees. This dossier was completed in 2004, and then submitted to a public inquiry. The dossiers dealing with these applications were the subject of a public inquiry from 30 November 2004 to 8 January 2005. The regulations authorising ANDRA to discharge effluent should be published in the Official Gazette in early 2006.