General Project Description

The final repository for radioactive waste at Morsleben (ERAM) was built in a former salt and potash mine previously owned by Burbach Kali AG. With its two shafts, Bartensleben and Marie, Morsleben is close to the villages of Morsleben and Beendorf, not far from the city of Helmstedt, near the border between the federal states of Lower Saxony and Saxony-Anhalt.

Here, in the upper valley of the Aller River, a salt deposit with a length of 40 to 50 km and an average width of 2 km had been developed at the end of the 19th century. Potash and rock salt were mined for about 70 years, leaving a mine with a length of 5.6 km and a maximum width of 1.4 km. The shaft Bartensleben was sunk to a depth of 524 m and four main mining levels were excavated underground. Mining was done using the room-and-pillar method without backfill. This produced caverns with a length of up to 120 m and a width and height of up to 40 m. The galleries used for the final disposal of waste until 1998 are situated in the mine's periphery. Shaft Marie serves exclusively as a second exit and as ventilation shaft and provides a rich store of geological-mineralogical and technical-historical objects.