Page 161 - Beyond Decommissioning

142 Beyond Decommissioning

6.1.5 Tihange NPP, Belgium

Tihange NPP has been already in operation for many years and the date of its
final shutdown is uncertain. A study was made a few years ago to redevelop
Tihange and territories nearby as an industrial strip. Details are given in Apperlo
(2011).

6.1.6 Windsor Site, CT, USA
Nuclear use of the 250-ha Windsor site started in 1955 when Combustion Engineering,
Inc. (CE) was tasked by the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) to manufacture
nuclear fuel for the US Navy including R&D. From the mid-1950s to 2000, the
site was involved in a range of activities related to nuclear fuel systems, as well as
large-scale fossil fuel boiler testing, and coal gasification. Activities produced both
low-level radioactive waste and chemical wastes.
By 2001, radiological operations came to an end, and decommissioning of the
installations commenced. Nuclear decommissioning ended in 2006 when the
NRC approved the Final Status Survey. In 2007, the United States Army Corps
of Engineers (USACE) and the NRC allowed the property owner (Asea Brown
Boveri, ABB, which acquired CE in 1990) to remediate the site areas included in
the Formerly Utilized Sites Remedial Action Program (FUSRAP) under NRC over-
sight. Remediation of these areas started in 2009 and ended in 2013 when USACE
and NRC approved the related Final Status Survey; then, the NRC license was
cancelled.
Early in the planning of site remediation, ABB selected the objective of
unrestricted use, as they estimated there was little difference in remedial costs between
an unrestricted residential and a restricted industrial/commercial use scenario.
Besides, ABB wanted to dodge the long-term maintenance and liabilities that would
remain under restricted use. This early decision determined the remedial objectives for
each of the remediation programs, and oriented the overall remediation strategy. In
2010, as the major remediation activities were coming to an end, ABB established
a joint venture with Winstanley Enterprises, LLC to redevelop the site. Early estab-
lishment of this alliance allowed the redevelopment plans to be coordinated with the
remaining remediation activities. Since 2010, redevelopment scenarios have included
light industrial, commercial, and residential reuse. To make the property available for
redevelopment opportunities, the redevelopment planners had a policy to release as
much of the site as possible, as soon as possible, from all regulatory requirements.
Therefore, steps were taken to release portions of the site once they met the applicable
release criteria.
In September 2013, as the first phase of the redevelopment, the first portion
of the site was transferred to Great Pond Village, LLC. The future vision for
the site is a phased development including residential and retail space. Detail
about the D&ER process and the redevelopment underway are given in
Shephard et al. (2014).