French regulators have confirmed that no radiation was released and no employees received excessive doses following an explosion at a nuclear waste treatment plant in France that killed one worker and injured four others Monday.
France's Autorite de Surete Nucleaire (ASN) reported that the resulting fire at the Centraco facility was under control by 1 p.m., local time, and did not damage the surrounding building. Later that day, ASN declared the event had ended and reported that no radioactive contaminants were released in the explosion.
The blast happened in a furnace at the site in the south of France that processes low-level nuclear waste. There, EDF subsidiary Socodei reduces, stabilizes or recycles a range of materials like slightly irradiated clothing and scrap metal. The explosion occurred while material contaminated mostly with cobalt-60 was being processed, according to the International Atomic Energy Agency. The facility does not handle nuclear fuel.
Areva, EDF's partner company, also owns facilities at Centraco that were not affected by the explosion. Monitoring by equipment on-site and ASN found no evidence that chemical or radiological materials escaped the furnace building. Although one worker was burned severely, ASN reported that none of the four injured workers was exposed to high levels of radioactivity.