RHONE-ALPES -- shut downPurpose/type: factory for the production of beryllium and of uranium carbide, and waste dumpLocation: Freney (Savoie) west of ModaneOperator: Pechiney Aluminium (site now owned by SFTRF)Period of operation: ? (uranium carbide 1962-1964)Actual production: 13,000 kg of uranium carbideVarious dates for the operation of the La Praz plant are printed. Andra gives 1952-1982. At the request of the CEA, La Praz produced uranium carbide between 1962 and 1964 [LeMo I.viii.92]. The Tribune de Genève confirmed that the La Praz site, like the neighboring site of Teppes, was used as a dump [TG 8.x.92]. We do not know whether a production unit as well as a dump was located at Teppes. In 1992 traces of beryllium were discovered on the La Praz site and radioactive emissions in the Teppes industrial dump. The “traces” of uranium 238 and thorium 232 detected at Teppes are “probably due to the metallurgy of rare earths rather than to rejects from the workshops” at Calypso and La Praz, according to Andra. At the request of the prefecture, the Teppes site was covered in 1993 with a layer of barren earth, which reduced the surface radioactivity, formerly 14 Bq/g maximum, to “background level.” Pechiney Aluminium has turned over the site to SFTRF, the company that operates concessions on autoroute A43. An agreement between the parties and a prefectoral decree forbid the company’s disturbing the biological cover or impacting the geotechnical stability of the site [Andra 00]. |