Source: EURLEX
Language: en
Format: md

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# 52013DC0489

**REPORT FROM THE COMMISSION TO THE COUNCIL AND THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT Operation of the High Flux Reactor in the year 2011 /\* COM/2013/0489 final \*/**

  

REPORT FROM THE COMMISSION TO THE
COUNCIL AND THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT

Operation of the High Flux Reactor in the
year 2011

The Council adopted on 25 May 2009 a
three-year (2009-2011) supplementary research programme to be implemented by
the Joint Research Centre (JRC) concerning the operation of the High Flux
Reactor (HFR) located in Petten, The Netherlands. Article 4 of this Council
decision provides that the Commission will inform yearly the European
Parliament and the Council by producing a report on the implementation of the
supplementary research programme. This 2011 HFR activity report is the third
and last of three yearly reports that have covered the whole supplementary
research programme.

In operation since 1961, and following a
new vessel replacement in 1984 and large repair in 2010 on the Bottom Plug
Liners (BPL), the reactor provides a variety of irradiation location
possibilities (reactor core, reflector region and in the poolside).

The main objectives of the supplementary
research programme are the following:

(1)
To ensure the safe and reliable operation of the
HFR in order to guarantee the availability of the neutron flux for experimental
purposes.

(2)
To allow an efficient use of the HFR by research
institutes in a broad range of disciplines: improvement of the safety of fuels
and materials for nuclear reactors of relevance for Europe, health including
the development of medical isotopes to answer questions of medical research,
nuclear fusion, fundamental research and training and waste management.

The HFR acts as a training facility for doctoral
and post-doctoral fellows, allowing them to perform research activities through
national or European Programmes.

The reactor is also used for the commercial
production of radio-isotopes.

The safe operation and research objectives
were fulfilled as follows in 2011:

1. Safe Operation of the HFR

The European Atomic Energy Community (Euratom)
is the owner of the plant (for a lease of 99 years) and the JRC the plant and
budget manager. The HFR reactor is operated by NRG (Nuclear Research and consultancy Group) which operates and maintains
the plant and manages the commercial activities around the reactor[1]. It has
an operating licence granted by the Dutch national regulator KFD (Kernfysische Dienst). As for nuclear power
plants, the HFR is subject to legally required 10-year periodic safety reviews
which are performed by NRG.

The HFR has been subject to an independent INtegrated Safety Assessment for Research Reactors (INSARR) review performed by the International
Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in April
2011. The INSARR review concluded that all the recommendations/suggestions
deriving from the safety review regarding the Bottom Plug Liner repair in 2010 and
about 50% of those deriving from the INSARR 2005 have been addressed. The
implementation of all the corrective actions will be completed in 2012.

Following the nuclear disaster in
Fukushima, Japan, in March 2011, the HFR and the other nuclear facilities on
the Petten nuclear site were subject to stress tests.

The results showed that the nuclear
installations met all of the safety-relevant licensing requirements and could
also withstand a wide range of extreme weather conditions, including flooding
and earthquakes or a combination of both. The stress test also showed that it
is feasible to increase the robustness of the nuclear facilities and their safety
margins by taking a number of extra measures for example in the domain of :
extra mobile equipment, reinforcement of structures, development of new
procedures etc. These measures are currently under implementation.

In 2011 the HFR was operational for 290
days. This performance corresponds to an actual availability of 99.22 % with
reference to the original scheduled operation plan. Nominal power was 45 MW
with a total energy production of approximately 13,008 MWd, corresponding to a
fuel consumption of about 16.24 kg U-235.

In the first quarter of 2011, the last 18
High Enriched Uranium (HEU) spent fuel elements were shipped in a CASTOR MTR2
container to the storage facility (HABOG) of the Dutch Central Organisation for
Radioactive Waste (COVRA).

The maintenance activities consisted of the
preventive, corrective and regular maintenance of all systems, structures and components
executed with the objective to enable the safe and reliable operation of the
HFR. The periodic license required a leak test (0.5 bars overpressure - 48
hours duration) and several modifications were performed (LOCA 4, 5 and 6). All
modifications were implemented after the revision of the plant description and
operating instructions and following the successful commissioning and testing
and licensing approval where necessary.

No incident on the International Nuclear
Event Scale (INES) was reported.

2. Research and isotope production

2.1 Research

The following ongoing scientific activities
were performed in 2011:

·
Managing NeT, the European Network on Neutron
Techniques Standardisation for Structural Integrity. The main experimental
activities in 2011 were relative to small angle scattering studies of materials
ageing processes;

·
Neutron diffraction investigations in nickel
based alloys;

·
Fuel irradiation experiments to reduce the
radiotoxicity of nuclear waste relative to minor actinide transmutation
technological issues (i.e. fission-products retention capabilities, dust-free
process, helium swelling);

·
Experiments to investigate reactor structural
material degradation under irradiation (graphites, model steels, realistic
welds and high-nickel welds);

·
Fusion reactor technology concerning the
irradiation and post irradiation examination of material foreseen in the
shielding blanket in ITER (CuCrZr).

2.2 Isotope Production

After three disrupted operational years for
isotope production in the HFR, 2011 was a year with a normal operational
pattern as experienced in the years before 2008. Once again, the HFR was able
to demonstrate that it plays an essential role as the largest producer of
medical isotopes in Europe and one of the largest producers in the world. The
total volume and value of the isotopes and associated services supplied from
the HFR grew again in 2011.

The production of Neutron Transmutation
Doped (NTD) silicon for the specialist electronics industry was resumed after
the final repair of the HFR in September 2010. During 2011, NRG returned to
using a standard configuration of the HFR production facilities and
reintroduced the irradiation of silicon ingots to produce high quality products
used in high voltage and other specialist electronic applications that can only
be served with NTD silicon.

In 2011 NRG continued to work closely with
other players in the Medical Isotope supply network, as well as with the
Medical Community, Governments, the European Commission, the OECD/NEA and the
IAEA. These actions were to continue to support the coordinated efforts
necessary to minimise the future risks to security of supply of critical
medical isotopes.

3. Financial
contributions for the execution of the programme.

In 2011, the following financial
contributions were received from Member States for the execution of the
programme: Belgium: 400,000 €, France: 300,000 €, The Netherlands: 8,223,000 €.

It should be noted that these contributions
cover the expenses according to Annex II of Council Decision 2009/410/Euratom.
These amounts have been calculated in order to balance the forecasted costs of
the reactor for the period 2011 taking into account an expected level of
commercial income. In no case does the Commission cover any operational
deficit, including potential costs for maintenance or repair.

The
Commission received in 2011 from the supplementary programme
800,000 € as provisions for the Decommissioning fund. This amount, together
with other expenditures (e.g. direct personnel, utilities, spent fuel management)
incurred by the Commission was paid from the supplementary programme budget for
a total of 5,597,000 €.

An
accompanying Staff Working Paper presents in more
detail all the results of the operation of the HFR in 2011.

[1]               on
20 June 1967 the JRC and Stichting Energieonderzoek Centrum Nederland, referred
to as “ECN”, (then called Stichting Reactor Centrum Nederland, referred to as
“RCN”) concluded a Co-operation Contract No. 054-68-1 PET N with regard to the
operational management of the HFR at the JRC's Site.

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