View Hoboken (Belgium) plant after the facelift (early 2009).
Radioactive waste in Olen
From 1922 until the end of the 1970s Umicore manufactured radium and uranium products in its plant in Olen, near Antwerp. Until the 1960s radium was the only treatment for cancer. Uranium oxide was used in fuel rods for nuclear power stations.
Radioactive waste emerging from the production process was stored on the plant site as specified by the permits. The production plants have since been decontaminated and dismantled, while the storage area for residues has been cleaned up so as to eliminate any possible adverse effect on employees and the environment.
Isolated 'spots' of contamination still exist inside and outside the plant owing to negligence due to the more limited knowledge and awareness of risks at that time.
A study commissioned by the Ministry of Public Health at the beginning of the 1990s and focusing on the near surroundings of Umicore Olen showed that 'at present there is no danger to public health and the environment'. That assessment still stands a decade later.
In order to ensure a safe handover to future generations however, this study did point out that ?an overall intervention concept for all contamination problems in the area around Umicore in St.-Jozef-Olen was essential?. This led to the establishment of a monitoring committee in 1993 which was to survey all the problems relating to radioactivity outside the factory walls and to work out the most appropriate long-term solution.
Umicore committed itself in 2002 to clean up the polluted premises outside the Umicore plant grounds in order 'to permanently improve an existing condition and effectively protect human beings and the environment over the long term'.
The 'BRAEM'-project ('Berging Radioactief Afval Extra-Muros' or 'Storage of radioactive waste off site') relates primarily to the D1 dumping ground and the 'Bankloop' stream and its banks. The bed and banks of this small river were contaminated by effluents from the waste water treatment plant; the D1 dump with contaminated building materials.
The recovered waste, after removing the too-heavily contaminated parts (the so-called 'hot spots') will be stored in a facility for very low-grade radioactive waste with passive management over the long term.
As the Bankloop crosses public grounds, the clean-up has a much higher priority than the D1 dump. The remediation works will therefore start in the autumn of 2006 and are expected to be finished by the end of 2008, ahead of the initial target of 2010. The waste material will be temporarily stored on-site and covered by a protective layer of clay. The cost of the clean-up is estimated at some Euro 3.5 million, equally shared between Umicore and the public authorities.
The clean-up of the Bankloop was decoupled from that of the D1 dumping ground, which would entail substantial costs. Additional studies on the best possible alternative to clean up D1 would make it impossible to realize the entire project before 2010, hence the split.
In this context, Umicore is waiting for the federal government to clarify the final destination of and responsibility for radioactive material of this type before proceeding on the clean-up of D1.
But the company did not want this issue to delay in any way the Bankloop clean-up, which is also the most pressing matter in the minds of the local population.