Nuclear Monitor #928

Jan van Evert

The French radioactive waste management agency Andra has published a new estimate of the overall cost of constructing, operating and closing France’s planned deep geological repository for high- and intermediate-level radioactive waste. The new figure is between 26.1 and 37.5 billion euros (at 2012 prices).

France plans to construct the Centre Industriel de Stockage Géologique (Cigéo) repository in a natural layer of clay near Bure, to the east of Paris. The repository consists of an underground system of disposal tunnels. The site would store 10,000 m3 high activity waste and 73,000 m3 long-lived medium activity waste produced by nuclear power plants, nuclear research centres and used nuclear fuel processing facilities.

That is a lot more expensive than previously calculated. In 2005, Andra estimated the cost of the facility at between 13.5 and 16.5 billion euros. However, in 2009 it re-estimated the cost at around €36 billion. In October 2014, Andra gave a revised cost estimate for Cigéo of €34.4 billion, based on 2012 prices. Early in 2016, the French Minister for Ecology, Sustainable Development and Energy set a target cost of 25 billion euros for the Cigeo project, covering the planned 150 years for its construction and operating. That now appears to be wishful thinking. The cost of the project and the location will be reviewed again, at least by 2026.

The facility is to be financed by radioactive waste generators: EDF, Orano and the French Alternative Energies and Atomic Energy Commission. Construction could begin by 2027 if the French nuclear safety authority (ASNR) approves the application, The first waste packages would be received in 2050. That is considerably later than the original date of 2035-2040