A number of environmental groups have appealed to the Conseil d'État to have Cigéo, the deep geological disposal site for radioactive waste in the Meuse and Haute-Marne departments, removed from the list of “operations in the national interest” and to annul project’s “Declaration of Public Utility”. Firstly, the Conseil d'État noted that several laws since 1991 have established the principle of deep geological disposal of highly radioactive waste as a permanent solution for managing highly radioactive waste over the very long term that guarantees a high level of protection for human health and the environment. It rejected the arguments put forward against the public inquiry, taking the view that the measures designed to avoid negative impacts on the environment and human health are adequate and that the requirement for the repository to be reversible has been met. The French Constitutional Council had found that the law providing for the Cigéo project is in line with the Constitution and, in particular, complies with the principle that, when adopting measures likely to affect the environment, the legislature must ensure that the decisions made to meet the needs of the present do not compromise the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. Taking this decision into account, the Conseil d’État ruled that the Cigéo project is in the public interest.
The Cigéo (industrial centre for geological disposal) project, implemented by ANDRA (the French radioactive waste management agency), provides for the disposal of high-level and intermediate-level, long-lived waste at a depth of 500 metres in stable, impermeable clay rock (Callovo-Oxfordian argillite). The disposal centre will start with an industrial pilot phase to demonstrate its safety. At the end of this phase, legislation will be required to authorise the continued operation of the centre. The legislator has stipulated that the reversibility of the facility must be guaranteed for a period of at least 100 years, during which time the radioactive waste packages stored in the centre must be retrievable.
In two decrees, dated 6 July 2022, the government announced the Cigéo Centre’s “Declaration of Public Utility” (DUP) and included the project on the list of operations in the national interest that are not bound by the usual planning laws. Several environmental groups appealed to the Conseil d'État to have these two decrees annulled. The decrees represent a key stage in delivering the project, which will require subsequent authorisations during the construction phase and before it becomes fully operational.
The inclusion of the Cigéo project on the list of operations in the national interest is legal
The environmental groups argued that the decree including Cigéo on the list of operations in the national interest did not comply with the French Town Planning Code, which sets local authorities’ sustainable development objectives for their town planning activities. However, the Conseil d'État ruled that those provisions apply to local planning documents but do not apply to projects included on the list of operations in the national interest, such as Cigéo.
The “Declaration of Public Utility” procedure was followed
The Conseil d'État found that the public had been able to find out about the project and submit comments. It took the view that the public inquiry dossier was sufficiently complete, including with regard to the feasibility of the project, and that it was based on numerous scientific studies carried out, in particular, in the underground laboratory built in 2000 in the commune of Bure (Meuse), to determine how to store radioactive waste so that it would not pose a risk to human health or the environment.
With regard to the elements relating to the cost of the project, the Conseil d'État pointed out that the dossier should – as was indeed the case – include an assessment of the expenses concerned with the creation of the storage centre, and not those involved in its operation, as the Declaration of Public Utility only relates to the work involved in creating the storage centre.
The Conseil d'État also ruled that the impact assessment concerning the siting of the storage centre was adequate. In fact, ANDRA's “safety options dossier” attached to the impact study, which explored different scenarios for ensuring the safety of the site, took into account all the hypotheses regarding the project’s vulnerability to the risk of accidents and disasters.
Adequate measures have been taken to prevent Cigéo having an impact on the environment and human health
It was clear from the dossier submitted to the judges that the risks raised by the applicants (e.g. fire from bitumen waste, emission of toxic chemicals etc.) and their consequences had indeed been identified. The Conseil d'État ruled that the planned measures for avoiding, reducing and compensating for the significant negative effects of the Cigéo storage centre on the environment and human health were adequate.
The project has met the requirement for radioactive waste disposal to be “reversible”, as defined by law
In response to the environmental groups’ claim that the law providing for the Cigéo project was unconstitutional, the Conseil d'État referred the question of constitutionality to the Constitutional Council so that the latter could rule specifically on the new question of future generations’ rights to environmental protection. In its decision of 27 October 2023, the Constitutional Council ruled, in unprecedented terms, that when the legislature adopts measures likely to cause serious and lasting damage to the environment, it must ensure that the decisions made to meet the needs of the present do not compromise the ability of future generations and others to meet their own needs, while preserving their freedom of choice in this respect. It then ruled that, in this specific case, the legislature had provided sufficient guarantees that the radioactive waste disposal centre would not infringe the right of future generations to live in a healthy, well-balanced environment.
The Conseil d'État noted that the dossier included plans for the reversibility of the radioactive waste repository to be tested through waste package retrieval tests during the industrial pilot phase, first on replica waste packages before the start of the repository operations, and then in real conditions. These tests should make it possible to confirm the results of the safety studies and respond to the recommendation of the environmental authority to carry out full-scale testing before the repository is put into operation.
The Cigéo project is confirmed to be in the public interest
In three acts (passed in 1991, 2006 and 2016), the French legislature opted for deep geological disposal, rather than surface disposal, of high-level and intermediate-level, long-lived nuclear waste produced in France. In its ruling of October 2023, the French Constitutional Council noted that this choice by the legislature had two objectives: to ensure that radioactive waste would be “stored in conditions that protect the environment and human health from the long-term risks of the release of radioactive substances” and to ensure that “the burden of managing this waste is not handed on to future generations alone”.
Within this legal framework, and after weighing up the advantages and disadvantages, including in terms of cost, the Conseil d'État confirmed that the Cigéo project is in the public interest.
Read the decision (in French)