Italy's long and unresolved issue with decades-old nuclear waste

The Government recently published the National Map of Eligible Areas, where the fifty-one sites deemed suitable to host are shown nuclear waste storage that every EU state should have.For the moment, the areas identified are limited to just six regions:Basilicata, Puglia, Lazio, Piedmont, Sardinia and Sicily.However, the list of sites could soon be enriched thanks to a debated new possibility introduced by the executive for local authorities and military structures.These will in fact be able to self-nominate to host the atomic waste even if, in fact, they will be subjected to a suitability assessment only later.Lazio, with 21 sites identified all in the Viterbo area, is the region with the largest number of suitable areas, followed by Basilicata, Piedmont, Sardinia, Puglia and Sicily.

Of all the sites, the Government will have to choose only one.However, the selection will be more complicated than expected.In fact, a few days after the publication of the Charter, many of the municipalities in which the sites fall were deemed suitable to host the depot they began to express their opposition.The reassurances from the Minister of the Environment were of no use, who he reiterated that storage will only affect low and very low activity waste (even if on site of the Ministry we speak of low and medium).In any case, not even at a regional level does it seem that anyone wants to be on the side of the executive.Puglia said it was "categorically against hosting the headquarters of the national radioactive waste repository".A position that follows what has already been declared by the president of Basilicata, from whom the first protests came.The head of the Lucanian council, Vito Bardi, immediately reiterated his no.«Our position – also underlined the Lucanian councilor for the environment, Cosimo Latronico – does not change and will not change», given that Basilicata «already offers an extraordinary contribution to the country's energy supply».Similar speech in Sardinia, where the regional council recently convened the States General precisely to make its opposition official.

There are approximately 80 thousand cubic meters of nuclear waste that Italy is desperately trying to store.A long-standing problem which, despite progress, appears far from being resolved.At least 50 thousand of these radioactive wastes are mostly derived from decommissioned nuclear plants when the Italians, twice, opted to say no to atomic energy.Another 28 thousand, however, derive from nuclear research plants and from the nuclear medicine and industrial sectors.Overall, it is inevitable not to notice how, decades later, Italy has still not been able to dispose of the waste resulting not even thirty years of nuclear activity.Yet the Government, in spite of the referendum decisions, seems determined to bring atomic energy back to Italy.Among many, for example, the National Platform for Sustainable Nuclear Power was launched a few months ago.In general, the pro-atom position of the conservative executive also emerged clearly in the latest Energy and Climate Plan, as well as at the COP28 summit in Dubai.

The intentions of the executive, for the moment, would be to improve the scientific and technological knowledge useful for a future development of the so-called fourth generation nuclear power, which – there he explained a year ago Professor Gianfranco Caruso - «sets out to answer the main questions that arise regarding the use of nuclear energy:reducing emissions, reliability, safety, availability of fuel reserves, minimization of radioactive waste and economic competitiveness".To date, however, there is no similar project "ready" to enter into commercial operation by 2030.At most, by that date, there will be several prototypes and demonstrations.The alternative, which Italy already seems willing to follow, is to accelerate the so-called SMR (Small Modular Reactors), «small nuclear reactors – Caruso specified – based on reliable and already proven technologies and which, in their evolution, could facilitate the development of the fourth generation".However, for a country still struggling with the waste of a dismantling that began over twenty years ago, these may still not be of help.Second a search created by the universities of Stanford and British Columbia, the mini-nuclear reactors will in fact produce much more waste than conventional power plants. Even 30 times greater. The causes of this side effect should be sought – according to scientists – in a higher required concentration of nuclides.

[by Simone Valeri]