Fourth European conference on management and disposal of radioactive waste
The proceedings of the Fourth European conference on management and disposal of radioactive waste, held in Luxembourg, in March 1996, have recently been published by the European Commission, DG XII. The conference was held to present and discuss research into radioactive waste disposal and management carried out within the Community's Framework Programmes. It provided an opportunity to highlight the progress achieved in the course of these programmes, as well as providing a forum for discussion on the following main topics: - General aspects of waste disposal and the safety of geological disposal systems; - Activities relating to the construction and operation of underground facilities in geological media considered suitable for investigation as candidate material for disposal. The proceedings contain invited papers on these subjects, as well as: - Studies of management systems; - Treatment of radioactive waste with a view to volume reduction; - Characterization and qualification of waste forms, packages and their environment, quality assurance and quality control; - Research to back up the development of underground repositories for eventual disposal; - Methods of evaluating the safety of disposal systems; - Construction and/or operation of underground facilities open to EU joint activities to develop and demonstrate emplacement techniques and to validate site and design criteria of deep geological repositories.