Nuclear, how the site for the national radioactive waste repository will be chosen

If all procedural steps go well, the national repository for the single authorisation should be in operation by 2039 after it has received the single authorisation in 2029. It was the Minister for the Environment and Energy Security, Gilberto Pichetto Fratin, who, in a recent hearing in Parliament, set the course after clarifying that 'the safe management of radioactive waste is an obligation that Italy has not only towards the European Union but above all towards its own citizens of today and future generations?

As the minister recalled, current legislation requires that all radioactive waste in our country be brought together in a single site, thus ensuring centralised and efficient management. "This will make it possible," Pichetto explained, "not only to safely dispose of low- and very low-activity waste, but also to optimise the safe storage of high-activity waste, while waiting to find a definitive geological solution for its disposal. The absence of a procedure for definitive disposal in a geological repository has, moreover, led Italy, the minister also recalled, to incur the opening by the European Commission of an infringement procedure..

The identification is based on Cnai's proposal, i.e. the document that identifies the areas of the national territory that are suitable to host the National Repository and that represents, Pichetto Fratin said, the result of a long and careful analysis conducted by Sogin, the public subsidiary whose mission is the dismantling of Italian nuclear plants and the management and safety of radioactive waste produced by industrial, research and nuclear medicine activities. The process of identifying the suitable areas took place "with the utmost scientific and technical rigour," the minister clarified in Parliament. Strict criteria were adopted to ensure that the areas identified were indeed suitable for hosting the infrastructure.

The areas identified that, after the re-perimeter, have maintained the dimensions and suitability criteria for the construction of the repository are 51 to date: the complete list is available on the Mase website: there are 10 in Basilicata (from Montalbano Ionico to Genzano di Lucania), 4 classified between Puglia and Basilicata, 1 in Puglia, 21 in Lazio (concentrated in the province of Viterbo), 5 in Piedmont (all in the province of Alessandria), 8 in Sardinia (from Albagiara to Guasila) and 2 in Sicily. No decision, it must be said, has yet been taken, the minister wished to reiterate with regard to these 51 eligible areas.

"I emphasise," he reiterated, "that the one published is still a proposal by Cnai, which has already been submitted to the opinion of Isin, the regulatory authority for nuclear safety and radiation protection, but it cannot be considered the definitive charter until the Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) procedure has been completed. The SEA, explained Pichetto Fratin, "will not only allow local administrations to take part in the decision-making process again, but will also offer the opportunity to investigate the possible economic and territorial development benefits connected to the construction of the National Depot. This is a crucial aspect, since the Repository represents not only an infrastructure for safe management, but also a development opportunity for the territories involved, as demonstrated by the many similar experiences at a European level. Only at the end of this phase will Sogin be able to possibly update the Cnai on the basis of the considerations that emerged during the Vas"..