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10 years, €2.8 billion later, decommissioning a distant goal in Bulgaria, Lithuania, Slovakiaby I-Nuclear |
Ten
years after the European Union began providing €2.8 billion of
financial assistance to Bulgaria, Lithuania and Slovakia for the closure
of ‘unsafe’ Soviet-era reactors, decommissioning of those reactors
remains a distant goal, according to a new report.
In
a special report released February 8, the European Court of Auditors
(ECA) said that the reactors have all been shut down and partly
defuelled, major preparatory works have been implemented and dismantling
works have started.
“However,
after more than 10 years of EU assistance, progress has been slow, as
many projects still involve preparatory activities. Moreover, the
situation is rather unclear concerning the needs still to be met as a
result of the early closure since no comprehensive needs assessment
exists,” the report said.
The
main work “is still ahead and its finalisation faces a significant
funding shortfall” of around €2.5 billion, the auditors said.
The
identification of decommissioning activities is still in progress, the
ECA report said. “Major infrastructure projects face delays and
cost-overruns. Cost estimates are not complete in the absence of key
information on radioactive waste and/or the facilities and technologies
required for their treatment,” the report said.
The
auditors found that a broad variety of activities were funded to
mitigate the consequences on the countries’ energy supply of the nuclear
reactors’ early closure, “but the degree of mitigation achieved is not
known.”
The
auditors said that should the European Commission follow through with
plans to provide additional financial assistance after 2013 when the
current program ends, the support “should be made conditional upon an ex
ante evaluation of the EU added value of such intervention, identifying
the specific activities to be financed through the EU budget and taking
account of other funding facilities such as Structural Funds.”
Reactors closed 2002-09
The
EU assistance provided for the closure of the reactors came as part of
the negotiations between the three countries over their entry into the
European Union, known as accession.
Under
their respective accession agreements, Bulgaria agreed to close the
four VVER 440 reactors at Kozloduy, Lithuania agreed to close the two
RBMK reactors at Ignalina, and Slovakia agreed to close the two VVER
440s at Bohunice V1.
The
EU committed some €2.8 billion between 1999 and 2013 for the three
countries, according to the report, both to assist in reactor closures
and to providing alternative energy projects to compensate for the loss
of productive reactors.
As
of December 31, 2010, when the auditors completed their review, the
Commission had committed over 70% of the EU financial contribution or
€2.06 billion.
Payments to contractors stood at €1.03 billion, representing almost half of com- mitted amounts, the report said.
Out of this amount, some 60 % and 40%, respectively, went to decommissioning and mitigation measures, the auditors said.
In
March 2011 the recipient countries updated their decommissioning cost
estimates, to reach €5.3 billion, the report said. A comparison with
the decommissioning funding currently available at national and
programme level suggests a shortfall of around €2.5 billion, the
auditors said.
Slovakia
has committed itself to topping up the funding needed for
decommissioning and has created a specific funding mechanism (a tax on
electricity transmission) to contribute towards reducing the funding
shortfall, the report said.
Lithuania
and Bulgaria have not put in place any equivalent mechanism. The
absence of sufficient funding arrangements puts the completion of the
decommissioning processes at risk, it said.
In
Bulgaria, an experimental plasma melting technology was selected in
Kozloduy without proper demonstration of its effectiveness and without
due consideration of the design and construction costs (some €30 million
compared to one fifth that for traditional technologies), the report
said.
In
Lithuania, at the time of the audit visit, the major infrastructure
projects, which are a precondition for the decommissioning of the
Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant, were significantly delayed compared with
initial contract completion dates.
The
delays included: the interim spent fuel facility — more than 32 months;
the solid waste retrieval facility — 44 months; the solid waste
treatment and storage facility for the management of short- and
long-lived low and intermediate level radioactive waste — 34 months. The
total project cost of the interim spent fuel facility increased by €22
million (15.6 %), the auditors said.
In
Slovakia, the interim radioactive waste storage at the Bohunice site,
initially expected to be commissioned in 2010, was still in procurement
process during the audit.
As
a result, the availability of buffer storage areas has been identified
as a potential bottleneck. The facility for the free release of
decommissioning materials was delayed by more than one year. Until the
facility is operational, no material can be released from Bohunice V1
NPP, the report said.
Commission Responds
The
European Commission was allowed to view and respond to the report
before it was made public February 8. Its response was included in the
report.
The
Commission defended the program, saying that “without the EU funds
provided for decommissioning and mitigation,” the reactors would not
have been shut down, “particularly given the concerted political
pressure in these three Member States, which reached its peak during the
severe gas supply crisis in early 2009.”
The
Commission said the financial assistance provided was an expression of
“solidarity” with the new member states and was never intended to
provide a set portion of the total decommissioning costs.
The
Commission said that “delays and cost overruns are not unusual,” given
that projects financed by the programmes are often long, complex and
politically sensitive.
The
Commission said that the “ultimate responsibility for decommissioning
and its financing” is on the nation state, and it is not the EU’s
responsibility to make up any shortfall.
Nonetheless,
the Commission said, plans for additional financial assistance for the
period 2014-20 are under discussion, but such support would be
conditional on the three countries “committing adequate additional
resources.” –David Stellfox
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