Jordan opens storage facility
22 March 2010
Jordan has inaugurated a national interim storage facility for the country's radioactive waste and nuclear materials. The facility was partly funded by the US Department of Energy (DoE).
The facility - constructed on the premises of the Jordanian Atomic Energy Commission (JAEC) headquarters on the outskirts of Amman - provides 500 cubic metres of storage for low- and intermediate-level radioactive waste for up to 50 years. The waste has been generated by hospitals, universities, industry and scientific research centres.
A contract for the design and construction of the facility was signed in March 2009 by JAEC and the US DoE's Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL). Under the agreement, DoE provided JAEC with some $500,000 for the construction of the central storage facility through its Global Nuclear Threat Fund.
Speaking during the opening ceremony of the facility, Ned Xoubi, nuclear fuel cycle commissioner at JAEC, said that currently 354 institutions and organizations in Jordan deal with 1600 radioactive sources, with 2600 workers in direct contact with the materials.
Previously, many institutions - chiefly hospitals and universities - kept used radioactive sources in "poor, unsafe and insecure storage," Xoubi told the Jordan Times.
The new facility will serve as a destination to store, catalogue and safeguard radioactive materials, with constant monitoring and a security system connected to the Public Security and the Civil Defence departments to prevent theft or misuse of stored materials by unauthorized personnel.
Xoubi noted that JAEC would continue cooperating with the US DoE on various technical aspects of the project and keep modernizing the facility with state-of-the-art equipment.
"Now we can show the world that we can deal with various aspects of a nuclear program whether in building nuclear reactors or nuclear waste treatment in accordance with the highest international standards," Xoubi told the Petra news agency. "Jordan will see many similar facilities, milestones and accomplishments before reaching the ultimate goal of producing electricity from nuclear power," he added.
The USA and Jordan signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) in September 2007 on cooperating on the peaceful use of nuclear energy.
Jordan is poor in terms of both energy and water resources. It currently imports some 95% of its energy requirements. Plans foresee a nuclear power plant for electricity and desalination in operation by 2015, and the country's Committee for Nuclear Strategy has set out a program for nuclear power to provide 30% of electricity by 2030 or 2040, and to provide for exports.
Researched and written
by World Nuclear News