RHONE-ALPES

Purpose/type: plant for metallurgy and machining of uranium

Location: a site at Annecy (Haute-Savoie) where installations of both Alcatel and Sicn are located

Operator: Sicn (originally Sacm)

Period of operation: since 1957

Raw materials: natural, depleted, and reprocessed uranium metal

Actual production: 2000 t/yr of fuel for graphite-gas reactors in 1982

In 1955, a factory belonging to La Société alsacienne de constructions mécaniques (Sacm) started operation on the site to manufacture fuel for the G1 reactor. Sicn took over the installations. Around that time Sicn and Alcatel were both part of the Hispano-Alsacienne group; Alcatel is the owner of the site. Since 1980, Sicn is a 100%-owned subsidiary of Cogéma.

Sicn was created for the mass production of natural uranium graphite gas fuel (UNGG). In 1960, it started up a second factory, at Veurey-Voroize, near Grenoble, in order to help the Annecy factory in its work. Using natural and reprocessed uranium, Sicn manufactured this fuel until 1990/91.

However, the company for a long time mass-produced, at Annecy, metal parts for nuclear fuel elements other than UNGG fuel. Because of an end to the manufacture of UNGG fuel, Sicn developed its line of products and began to move into new areas. In the year 2001, the Annecy plant includes the following divisions: DMA (Division Mécanique Annecy); DRA (Division Rectification); DUR: Metallurgie; Plasma Revêtement- Céramique; Graphite; and Quartz. In 1998, the CEO, Henri Staeger, noted that the “non-nuclear” would thereafter amount to 30% of the company’s volume of activity [DauLib 3. ii.98]. The letters UR in the name DUR stand for uranium, but according to the Sicn Web site, “the DUR division opens its industrial capabilities to other metals”.

Nonetheless, Sicn and DUR promote the use of what they write of as “industrial uranium, also called depleted uranium,” for which they have been developing various applications since 1957. According to their Web site, “the slight proportion of U235 [in depleted uranium] allows the use of this material as non-nuclear”. “The 18.7 density of uranium makes it favorable for use in the following; 1) radioprotection” (medical, industrial, nuclear) and “2) the armament industry: inertial masses and projectiles.” The Web site also describes Sicn’s capabilities for manipulating uranium. Sicn applies the following transformation techniques: melting (the Annecy plant is Cogema’s only one to include a foundry), wire-making, laminating, finishing and heat treatment, and machining. The “DUR takes charge of problems of transport and management of the base materials.” Moreover, the “DUR administers relations with security organisms (procedures, editing of dossiers, follow-up on uranium accounting…)” [SicnW 00] .

The Annecy plant works in both civilian and military areas. On the civilian side, it furnishes, for example, depleted uranium for the Silva enrichment process and for shields for industrial radioactive sources. On the military side, since 1982, Sicn has manufactured special parts for weapons [Comag vii-viii.82]. Depleted uranium (and/or parts in depleted uranium to be worked) come directly from Cogéma; from Valduc, from Bruyères-le-Châtel, or from the United States. The factory has produced kinetic munitions (projectiles), armor, targets. 

In 1995, a new building [was] being constructed to satisfy a contract passed with Giat (Groupement industriel des armements terrestres [Industrial Group for Land Weapons]). 

It was for mass production of bars of kinetic weapons for tanks and armored vehicles” [défi iii.95]. Sicn machined 60,000 penetrators for the 120 mm munition APFSDS-T OFL 120 F2, used by the Leclerc tank.  The remainder of the munition was made by Giat Industries of Salbris.  Sicn also, it seemed, machined the 105 mm munition APFSDS-T OFL 105 E2, used by the F1 canon of the AMX-30 tank of Giat Industries [Obsan, #5, x.00].

Like Giat Industries, Matra Defense is a client of Sicn. The Mechanical Division states that “The sectors of activity requiring Confidential Defense accreditation find the necessary organization within DMA.”

The Web site makes very clear the desire of the company to extend the areas and range of its activity by means of exports.

July 1, 2002, Cogéma announced in a press release that Sicn-Annecy was ending its work in uranium metallurgy and from that date was placing its mechanical work under a new company named Gemma.  Gemma, a 100% subsidiary of Sicn, has its headquarters at Sicn's Annecy facilities.  

Not until Prefectoral decree no. 1817-93 of 24 September 1993 was the situation concerning on-site management of wastes regularized..

Because of particles of uranium and uranium oxide, the possibility of contamination of the inside and outside air exists at the foundry, at the uranium store, at the workshop for recycling shavings, at the oxidation building.

Rain and cooling water were, as of 1993, directed towards cesspools on the site.

Water contaminated by uranium was directed to the city sewers after physical-chemical treatment. Releases of these waters should be limited to 40 m3/day and 4 m3/h. The total average concentration in uranium should not exceed 3 mg/l… The maximum concentration should not exceed 10 mg/l. The operator should “between now and 1994, aim for a release in uranium at the exit from the decontamination facility of less than 1.5 mg/l in average concentration and less than 50 g/day in flow.”

The liquids contaminated by hydrocarbons can be released without treatment if the concentration reaches 20 ppm or less. The plant uses toluene, nitric acid, and trichloroethylene which must be evacuated from time to time.

A 1988 report from the Direction des applications militaires (Dam) presented the solid waste situation at that date. At that time Sicn received uranium residues from Bruyères-le-Châtel (B-III) and from sites that had sent their wastes to Bruyères. Annecy treated and may still treat by three methods the residues of the Dam and the residues produced by the plant itself:

--by compaction and melting of shavings without oil. B-III sent to Annecy in 1988 only depleted uranium shavings. In 1993, the operations of sorting, recycling, and compacting took place in the Workshop for recycling shavings.

--By grilling in an oven, for every uranium alloy free of oil. The grilling “consists in heating the uranium to 500 degrees Centigrade in a dynamic atmosphere enriched in oxygen. The metallic uranium is transformed into oxide U308.” The Dam sold the natural U308 that it owned to Cogéma. The depleted U308 remained the property of the Dam, but was sent to Cogéma-Pierrelatte for storage [Ambolet 88]. In 1993, grilling took place in the oxidation building. A 1994 publicity brochure from Sicn mentions the grilling and the packaging of the uranium for storage among its advanced technologies.

--By melting the “ungrillables” such as refractory alloys. 

The shavings and the particles covered in oil posed a problem. Sicn experienced problems as a result of the release of hydrogen from drums of particles, packed in oil and stored for more than ten years. It was necessary to repackage all of them on an emergency basis while waiting until a treatment solution could be found. In 1988, B-III sent these wastes to be burned in the open air [Ambolet 88], probably at Moronvilliers. It is probable that Sicn likewise evacuated some wastes for burning.

Other solid wastes:

--Filters and uranium dusts other than those from the grilling.

--Graphite molds and crucibles. They are recycled in the foundry if possible; otherwise, they are evacuated. Before 1969, Cerca and Sicn stored 10,400 t of graphite, quartz, and sludge from sanding in the former Bauzot mine (Saône-et-Loire) [Andra 96].

--Sludges from wet sanding and from the treatment of water coming from the thermal treatment installations, from rectifying under water. The decree talks about the evacuation of the sludges as radioactive waste and mentions the grilling of the sludges.

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