The definitions of different types of nuclear waste are inconsistently applied, creating confusion - sometimes deliberately - as to what kind of waste is being addressed. The reason for this is that anything can become radioactive waste: gloves, protective clothing, the walls of the reactors, vehicles used in cleanup operations, wildlife living too close to reprocessing plants…simply as a result of exposure to strong radiation sources.

Intermediate Level Waste (ILW)
ILW can be anything from High Level Waste in diluted form to 'chemical process residues, decayed sealed sources and industrial gauges, reactor components, irradiated fuel cladding, ion-exchange filters etc…ILW requires special shielding during handling, transport and storage, and long-term immobilisation and isolation from the biosphere'.1

Long Lived Intermediate Level Waste (LLILW)
LLILW is the most common term for High Level Waste that has been allowed to cool off until most of the short-lived isotopes have decayed. Long-lived transuranic elements (ie heavier than uranium) such as plutonium, as well as fission products such as strontium-90 and cesium-137 remain within the fuel and must be isolated from the biosphere for thousands or even millions of years. Somewhat deceptively, solid and liquid wastes from reprocessing operations are also defined as LLILW.

These wastes are the result of dissolving nuclear fuel to extract plutonium for plutonium fuelled reactors or nuclear weapons. The fuel from Lucas Heights that has already been reprocessed at Dounrey in Scotland and La Hague in France will one day be returned to Australia as LLILW.

The Federal Government has no current contingency plan for what to do with this waste if and when it returns.

Short Lived Intermediate Level Waste (SLILW)
'SLILW contains significant levels of beta, gamma and alpha radiation emitters with half-lives of less than 30 years. SLILW requires special shielding during handling, transport and storage, and immobilisation and isolation from the biosphere for at least 300 years'.1

Low Level Waste
Contains low levels of beta and gamma radiation emitters and low levels of alpha emitters. LLW is produced from many phases of the nuclear power and weapons industry, but also from medical and industrial applications. Anything coming into contact with radioactive material can be considered Low Level Waste.

This is a remarkable and disturbing property of radiation which has never been fully appreciated by the industry, which still tries to convince people that cleanup of major radioactive contamination is possible.

LLW is stored at many sites around Australia including the Mt Walton facility not far from Coolbardie.

References

1. The Safe Management of Australia's Radioactive Waste - Ben Aylen June 2000