The Need and Necessity for the MIS Sigyn's Advanced Communication and Navigation Systems, Adapted for Marine Transport of Radioactive Materials

As far back as 1978, the Swedish Nuclear Fuel and Waste Management Co, SKB, decided to design and develop an integrated marine transport system, ISTS, a system that would meet the transportation needs of the Swedish nuclear power plants for the present and for the future, a system that would satisfy all the requirements and expectations that the principals, public authorities and the general public could have in respectofSKB.The system as conceived was at that time, and is still today, unique. Despite the fact that the highest safety standards were applied, it was completed, though not entirely finalized, in 1982. Pending completion of the central interim storage facility for spent fuel, CLAB, some shipments were sent during the years 1983-1984 to the reprocessing plant at La Hague in France, but from the summer of 1985, when CLAB was ready for operation, the fuel shipments have mainly been to Swedish facilities. Since the final repository for low- and intermediate-level waste was commissioned in the spring of 1988, the entire transportation system has been finished and operational. The principle transport routes for M/S Sigyn are shown in figure 1.