A lot of money has already been spent for this hotly contested project. The first step towards the implementation of the storage site known as Cigeo (Centre Industriel de Stockage Géologique) was the construction of the Meuse/Haute Marne Underground Research Laboratory. It is located 500 metres underground in Bure (North Eastern France) in the Meuse department allowing the study of the geological formation in order to evaluate its capacity for deep geological storage of high level and long lived medium level radioactive waste. It is managed by the 'Agence nationale pour la gestion des déchets radioactifs' (Andra). Its construction began in 2000, having been underway since 1994 as a result of the 1991 law on the management of nuclear waste. The signature of a contract between ANDRA and a joint venture of two engineering companies (Technip and Ingérop) in the beginning of 2012 ended this phase of study and research. |