TN Gemini™ : the Transport Cask for Technological Waste
A high-volumetric cask with the external geometry of an ISO 20-ft container. Internal arrangements for more flexibility and adaptability to waste forms and loading operations. A specious cavity allowing large components load.
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Operators and waste producers are facing financial and schedule challenges to manage and move the nuclear material from sites. The logistics and the transport packages are getting more and more critical to achieve cost and time savings.
In this context, customers expressed their need for a capacitive solution to move technological waste and fissile material conditioned into drums that can have multiple dimensions.
Taking account of alpha emitters, due to the presence of plutonium or americium in the waste inventory, requires using a Type-B package in order to ensure the containment.
A Type-B package with a cylindrical geometry is commonly considered as the best solution to comply with ADR safety requirements (9 m drop test). However, the cylindrical geometry is not an optimized solution when considering its capacity to transport a large quantity of drums in one batch.
Orano NPS has developed a unique Type-B container to transport safely all kind of drums containing technological and alpha contaminated waste.
The TN GeminiTM container is a highly capacitive, multimodal solution (road, rail, sea) equipped with ISO corners and has similar dimensions as an ISO 20-ft container.
Its shielding and tightness capacities are compatible with a very large spectrum of waste (alpha–contaminated (U,Pu), fissile content, radiolysable solid waste), while the large parallelepipedal cavity enables to transport many drums of various sizes (up to 40 drums of 118 liters) and large contaminated object.
Main characteristics of the TN GeminiTM packaging
Internal dimensions
Width: 1 840 mm
Height 2 000 mm
Length 4 510 mmExternal dimensions
container with ISO corners
(dimensions 2 500 x 2 650 x 6 058 mm)Mass
Empty 24 200 kg
Useful load 5 800 kg
Total 30 000 kgIn the market of Type-B casks for waste transport, the TN GeminiTM is a market-leading package:
- Type B(M) Fissile,
- high volumetric transport capacity,
- high flexibility in the variety of loaded waste,
- French and UK acclaimed safety certificate since 2000.
Allowable contents:
- Alpha–contaminated waste (U,Pu)
- Fissile content
- ‘Radiolysable’ solid waste
- Large contaminated object
- Drums:
- up to 60 drums of 100 L or 118 L
- up to 2 drums of 400 L mixed with 36 drums of 118 L
- up to 2 drums of 870 L
- 1 Waste Box loaded with:
- up to 9 drums of 200 L
- up to 5 drums of 400 L
- bulk material
TN GeminiTM containers are operated since 2000 with full customer satisfaction. 9 contents were licensed. Currently, Orano NPS manages a full fleet of several casks for leasing to Customer, in partnership with CEA.
Since the beginning, Orano NPS performs renewal of certificate and periodic maintenance of the fleet.
Orano NPS provides to its Customers a complete range of services as follows:
- transportability study,
- specific design and manufacturing of internal arrangements,
- license extension (if required),
- transports,
- design authority expertise and services to liaise with Nuclear Safety Authorities
- maintenance (if customer owned) and condition assessment,
- technical support to operators,
- procurement of ancillary equipment and operating tools.
- Type-B(M) for fissile material:
- transport package for Alpha / Pu contaminated waste
- various internal arrangements adapted to different size of drums
- Same dimensions as an ISO 20-feet container
- Flexibility and versatility in loading and capacity, thanks to the internal arrangements
- Specific loading / unloading equipment: horizontal loading of drums inside the cask through a platform
- A large size of cavity for large components
