The site for Posiva’s repository at Eurajoki for the disposal of Finland’s high-level radioactive waste (used nuclear fuel), near the Olkiluoto nuclear power plant, was selected in 2000. The Finnish parliament approved the the repository project the following year in 2001… The government granted a construction licence for the project in November 2015 and construction work on the repository started iin 2016.  Posiva’s plan is for used nuclear fuel to be packed inside copper-steel canisters at an above-ground encapsulation plant, from where they will be transferred into the underground tunnels of the repository, located at a depth of 400-450 meters, and further into deposition holes lined with a bentonite buffer. Operation of the repository is expected to begin in 2023. The cost estimate of this large-scale construction project totals about EUR500 million (USD570 million), the company said.

Posiva  announced on June 25, 2019  the start of construction of the used fuel encapsulation plant. Janne Mokka, Posiva’s President, noted, “In Finland, full lifecycle management of nuclear fuel is a precondition for the production of climate-friendly nuclear electricity. Posiva will execute the final disposal of the spent fuel of its owners’ Olkiluoto and Loviisa nuclear power plants responsibly.”

Sweden is planning a similar used fuel encapsulation and disposal facility using the same storage method. Under its current timetable, national radioactive waste management company Svensk Kärnbränslehantering AB plans to start construction of the used fuel repository and the encapsulation plant sometime early in the 2020s and they will take about 10 years to complete.

Exceprts from Work starts on Finnish fuel encapsulation plant, World Nuclear News, June 25, 2019

See also documentary “Into Eternity” (YouTube)