Construction work has officially started on a new facility for the storage of nuclear waste in Sweden.
The country’s minister for climate and environment, Romina Pourmokhtari attended the groundbreaking ceremony for the Swedish Spent Fuel Repository (SFR) located in Forsmark, Östhammar Municipality
The final repository will be ready for disposal in the 2030s, and will be fully extended in the 2080s.
Sweden is said to be one of the leading countries in the world in terms of the progress it has made with its nuclear waste programme.
The Swedish nuclear fuel and waste management company, SKB, which is owned by the country’s nuclear power plants, has been researching and developing technology for the geological final disposal of nuclear waste for more than 40 years.
In autumn 2024, SKB received an environmental permit and an enforcement order from the Land and Environmental Court, which means that work can now begin.
Stefan Engdahl, chief executive of SKB, said: “This is a historic day for the Swedish nuclear waste programme. We’re taking an important step and breaking the ground for a final solution for spent nuclear fuel. This sees us creating good conditions for continued fossil-free electricity production.”
Pourmokhtari represented the government on site and was first to break the ground.
The construction of the SFR will take 10 years before disposal can begin, after which the repository will be gradually extended over a long period.
The groundbreaking marked the start of two years of preparatory work above ground, including the construction of a rock mass storage and water treatment plant, a bridge over the cooling water canal, and forest clearing. After that, work begins to go down into the bedrock.
The final repository will be located at a depth of around 500 metres in rock that is 1.9bn years old. It is planned to hold approximately 12 000 tonnes of spent nuclear fuel in 6 000 canisters.
The surface section will cover a total area of 24 hectares, the equivalent of 44 soccer fields. When fully extended, the repository will contain more than 60 kilometres of tunnels.
Main image: Romina Pourmokhtari, the Swedish government’s minister for climate and environment, breaks ground on the construction of the Spent Fuel Repository. Image courtesy of SKB. Credit: Frida Karlsson Fotografi
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