Rearrangement works of unbalanced waste packages by influence of the Great East Japan Earthquake

Ishihara, Keisuke; Kanazawa, Shingo; Kozawa, Masachiyo; Mori, Masakazu; Kawahara, Takahiro

At radioactive waste management facilities in the Nuclear Science Research Institute, solid radioactive wastes are stored by using containers such as 200L drums and pallets to tier containers in 2 to 4 stacks in the height direction in waste storage facilities (Waste Storage Facility No.1, Waste Storage Facility No.2 and Waste Size Reduction and Storage Facility). On March 11, 2011, the Great East Japan Earthquake was happened, and some waste packages dropped from their pallets and large number of waste packages moved from their original position and inclined due to the influence of the earthquake in the waste storage facilities. There was no experience of rearrangement works to set those dropped and unbalanced waste packages in their original position and it was necessary to prepare detailed work procedures and progress for this task to prevent the occurrence of industrial accidents. Therefore, we prepared detailed work manual and repeatedly carried out mock-up test. And then, we started rearrangement work from April 2011 after confirmation of workers skill and adequacy of the work manual. Finally, all rearrangement works for stored waste packages took about four and half years and were completed in September 2015 without any accident and shutdown of storage function. This report summarizes the countermeasures to reduce exposure doses of workers and to prevent the occurrence of industrial accidents during the rearrangement works.