8 Nov (NucNet): The UK’s Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA) is reprioritising some of its 8.5 billion pound (GBP) (17 billion US dollars, 12 billion euro) decommissioning budget for the next three years to deal with “high hazard facilities” at Sellafield in England and Dounreay in Scotland.
The NDA, which was established in 2005 to oversee the long-term management of the UK's nuclear legacy, yesterday opened a three-month consultation on its business plan for the next three years.
Chief executive Ian Roxburgh said the authority’s priority is hazard reduction and it will be focused on the sites that require the most work. “This means the majority of funds over the next three years will be focused on Sellafield and Dounreay.”
Mr Roxburgh said that in order to deliver “real progress” in dealing with the high hazard facilities at Sellafield and Dounreay, funding will need to be reprioritised from other areas.
“It is increasingly clear that due to operational difficulties at Sellafield, the timescales for defuelling the Magnox stations will need to be re-assessed,” he said.
In April 2007, the NDA said it wanted to speed up decommissioning of five of the country’s Magnox sites – Berkeley, Bradwell, Dungeness A, Hinkley Point and Sizewell A – and launched a competition to find a contractor to manage them.
But yesterday the authority said “intelligence now suggests” there is limited market interest in the proposed competition. “For this reason, we have chosen to pause and to take stock of the lessons learned to date in order to consider how best to move forward with our competition schedule.”
The NDA’s budget has been hit by the closure of the thermal oxide reprocessing plant (Thorp) at Sellafield. Thorp, which reprocesses fuel from British Energy and overseas commercial customers, has been out of action for nearly two years. Limited work is being carried out in preparation for a full start-up scheduled next year.
The authority’s GBP 8.5 billion spending over the next three years is an increase of GBP 671 million on the previous three-year period. The total cost of delivering its remit now stands at GBP 72.7 billion, GBP 7.9 billion higher than the previous estimate.
The business plan can be downloaded from the NDA’s website (www.nda.gov.uk).
