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A Swedish company is ready, willing and able to recycle the steam generators from Bruce Power's Bruce A Restart project.

Bjorn Amcoff and Bo Wirendal of Studsvik in Sweden, were at Bruce Power Wednesday afternoon (June 16) and spoke to the media about the process and what measures are being taken to ensure it is done properly and safely.

The company has been hired to process all 32 steam generators at Bruce A, beginning this fall with the 16 removed from Units 1 and 2.

Amcoff said Studsvik can recycle 90 per cent of the metal in the steam generators, returning the 10 per cent of radioactive waste to Bruce Power for long-term storage. Once processed, the metal is clean enough to be returned to the public domain, he said.

The process begins with steel grit blasting of the steam generators - basically, shooting at the surface to remove the radioactive contamination, he said. Those radioactive solids - slag and blasting residue - will be shipped back to Bruce Power in the same containers used to send the steam generators to Sweden.

The metal is then chopped into small pieces and melted down and the resulting product can be recycled, Amcoff said. It takes about two to three months to process a steam generator but the company can do more than one at a time.

"We follow all the standard safety procedures for handling nuclear waste," said Amcoff. "This is low-level nuclear waste and we are following all protocols for handling this type of hazardous material."

The company has been doing this type of work since 1987, accepting these products usually three to four times per year, said Amcoff, but this is the first time Studsvik has handled steam generators from a CANDU reactor and the first time it has dealt with Canada.

Most of its business has been with northern Europe,particularly Sweden, Germany and Belgium.

"We make steel ingot - 600-kilogram metal pieces - that are sent to other steelworkers for reuse," said Amcoff.

Just as Canada has the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission (CNSC), Sweden has the SSM which regulates the industry there, he said.

Three years ago, he said, Studsvik was invited to Canada to make a presentation to the nuclear industry about how it deals with steam generators in Europe, said Amcoff. Then it began talks with Bruce Power about the restart project at the Bruce Nuclear site.

Studsvik has 1,200 employees at facilities in Sweden, the United States, the United Kingdom and Germany, said Amcoff.

As in other projects, the steam generators will be shipped on a vessel from Canada to Sweden, he said. Studsvik has its own harbour at its site and the steam generators will be transported to the staging tent and then into the treatment hall. Then the processing takes place, with the major part being the decontamination of the 4,000 tubes inside each steam generator.

Studsvik guarantees 90 per cent of the product in the steam generators will be free-released, clean metal which can be sent to the public domain, said Amcoff.

John Peevers of Bruce Power communications, said the nuclear generator has a $32-million contract with Studsvik to process the 32 steam generators from Bruce A.

He said that after Labour Day, Bruce Power will begin shipping out the steam generators. They will be trucked to Owen Sound and sent by boat over the Great Lakes and on to Sweden.

The proposed route would follow Bruce County Road 20 to Highway 21, north to Port Elgin and then east along Bruce County Road 17 to Burgoyne.

From there, the planned route is over the Thede Bridge to the B-Line and north to Highway 21.

On Highway 21, the route goes east to Jackson, then south to Grey County Road 5, east to Highway 6 and10, and north to Owen Sound.

Amcoff admitted to hearing opposition to nuclear from time-to-time. However, people in Europe believe Studsvik's recycling of the steam generators from nuclear reactors is the most reasonable process for dealing with these products.

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Sunday, June 20, 2010