The total number of nuclear warheads that need to be dismantled in Russia*** is about 18-20 thousand.
It must be taken into account that nuclear warheads are something with a very great potential danger, posing a serious threat to people and the surrounding environment. Therefore, there exists a rule that the dismantling of each warhead should be carried out at its manufacturer and by the specialists who installed it. U.S. experts estimate that the cost of dismantling each warhead varies from $30,000 to $150,000, depending on its complexity.
Massive dismantling of nuclear warheads raises scientific and technological problems, economic problems and ecological problems related to fissile nuclear substances. One of the current weaknesses in dismantling nuclear rockets is the construction of modern warehouses dedicated to the safe storage of highly enriched uranium and plutonium.
In order to guarantee nuclear and ecological security, the 5 to 8 kilogram parts made up of uranium or plutonium that are dismantled from the warheads are put into specialized metal boxes for storage. Similarly, these metal boxes will be placed in sealed steel containers filled with noble gases and certain protective substances. These containers should be kept in specialized warehouses located deep underground, which must be equipped with multiple guarding, defense and fire-fighting systems and maintained at optimum temperature and humidity.
It is estimated that all Russian or U.S. nuclear warheads contain a total of about 100 tons of plutonium and 500 tons of highly enriched uranium.
In the S&T program, there are relatively simple ways to make effective use of highly enriched uranium by: diluting and processing it to 3 to 4 percent uranium-235; and using it to make heat-releasing elements for nuclear power plants. Signed between Russia and the United States on the sale to the United States of 500 tons of Russian military uranium suitable for use in nuclear power plants.
The problem of disposing of military plutonium is more complex. At present neither the United States nor Russia has mastered an ecologically safe and economically affordable process for the effective use and elimination of plutonium. The difficulty of disposing of plutonium is compounded by the fact that plutonium is highly toxic and has a long half-life (24,000 years.) Two to three grams of plutonium spread over an area of one square kilometer can adversely affect the lives of the local population for thousands of years to come.
Another problem is the power reactors used in nuclear submarines as strategic weapons.
The former Soviet Navy began arming itself with nuclear submarines in large numbers in the early 1960s, making the former Soviet Union one of the world's largest possessors of nuclear submarines. After the end of the Cold War, the vast majority of the former Soviet Union's nuclear submarines were inherited by Russia. However, few of the nuclear submarines that fell into Russian hands at this time have a strategic role in nuclear deterrence left.
Because the former Soviet Union was only seeking to obtain an overwhelming advantage in the number and hasty development of the first and second-generation nuclear submarines, whether it is the performance or quality, are not to be commended, and then after decades of wind and waves, sea water erosion, most of them are already old and worn out, has come to the point of non-elimination of the inevitable. According to informed sources in the Russian Navy, Russia's Pacific Fleet has a large number of old nuclear submarines to receive a "retirement certificate", docked in the Russian Far East region of Bostwaya Bay. As a result of the protracted docking in the harbor, and no funds and manpower for maintenance, these nuclear submarines from the shell to the main components of most destructive corrosion. The nuclear reactor, the heart of a nuclear submarine, is not directly immersed in seawater, but it is also badly corroded. In order to prevent nuclear leakage caused by the nuclear reactor, the Russian Navy experts injected a large number of powerful anticorrosive agents into these nuclear reactors to slow down the corrosion. But it's clear to everyone that this kind of stopgap measure can't solve the problem completely.
Decades ago, when the nuclear submarine was just introduced, the Soviet Union and the United States of America's nuclear submarine experts designed to deal with the decommissioning of the nuclear submarine program is almost exactly the same: the old nuclear submarine will be sunk into the depths of the ocean as a whole. But with the advancement of science and technology, human environmental protection awareness is increasing, will be the old nuclear submarines sunk to the bottom of the sea program is no longer feasible.
The Russian Navy has built a specialized nuclear submarine dismantling plant with a complete set of large-scale technological equipment next to the Gulf of Bostovaya. Here, the old nuclear "heart" is removed in this way: specialized workers first remove the movable steel plates on the outside of the reactor, then remove the radiation-protected shell of the reactor's control unit, and then remove the complex piping that used to carry out the nuclear reaction, and carefully load it into a special radiation-protected loading cylinder. Finally, the loading cylinder is moved to a repository on a repair ship that has long been docked on the side of the nuclear submarine, and transported to a special underground burial site for nuclear waste, or "nuclear graveyard," for permanent storage.
The "corpses" of the spent nuclear submarines, their "hearts" removed, were transported to another plant. Here, the huge hulls are cut into several parts, and the useful metals and rubbers removed are recycled. According to statistics, on average, a nuclear submarine can remove 300 tons of rubber, and the removed steel, such as made of steel plates can be filled with two trains. It can be seen, the use of used nuclear submarines, the economic benefits are obvious, from the protection of the ecological environment, its significance is also great.
But this "theoretical" "benign recycling method" but the financial constraints of the Russian Navy can not help.
The scale of the work to dismantle and decontaminate nuclear submarines is a testament to this. There are already 150 nuclear-powered ships and boats sitting idle in ports. By the beginning of the 21st century, according to the first and second phases of the treaty on strategic offensive arms, the number of these ships will reach 200, including 150 nuclear submarines. Each ship has one or two nuclear reactors. Existing processing equipment can only effectively dispose of 2 to 3 nuclear submarines per year.
Operations such as disassembling and removing the reactor compartments, removing used reactive fuel and transporting it to the processing and storage sites are the most complicated operations from the ecological point of view. In order to ensure the safety of transportation, special train compartments with heat-releasing containers have been designed. Such carriages and containers guarantee safety in the event of accidents, fires and destructive activities.
Because of the lack of adequate storage, Russia cannot for the time being completely abandon the practice of leaving some of the nuclear waste from nuclear submarines at the bottom of the ocean.
In this way, the last resort is to build nuclear graves.