Waste Management

Bulgaria Regulator Grants Operating Licence For Kozloduy Spent Fuel Storage

By Kamen Kraev
15 February 2016

Bulgaria Regulator Grants Operating Licence For Kozloduy Spent Fuel Storage

15 Feb (NucNet): Bulgaria’s Nuclear Regulatory Agency (NRA) has issued a 10-year operating licence for a dry-storage facility for spent fuel at the Kozloduy nuclear power station in northern Bulgaria, the NRA said.

The facility is for storing spent nuclear fuel from Kozloduy’s four Russian-built VVER-440s, which are being decommissioned, a statement by the power station said.

The statement said the facility will provide Kozloduy with intermediate storage capacity for spent nuclear fuel for “no less than 50 years”.

In October 2011, Bulgaria awarded a multi-million dollar contract to an international consortium for the design of a national low-level waste and intermediate-level waste repository on a site next to the Kozloduy nuclear plant.

In 1999, Bulgaria closed down Kozloduy nuclear power plant’s four VVER 440-230 units as a condition of entry into the EU.

Units 1 and 2 were shut down in 2002 and units 3 and 4 in 2006. Kozloduy-5 and -6 are newer VVER-1000 units and provide just over one third of the country’s electrical power production.

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