HSE and the Environment Agency have each published a number of assessment reports following the completion of their initial assessment of the four nuclear power station designs. They have also published the reports of joint inspections they carried out into the quality management arrangements for each of the companies having their designs assessed.
From 1 January, 2009 we are publishing a series of quarterly reports on the GDA process. The reports, which summarise where we are and highlight the key challenges we face going forward, are part of our drive to increase the public understanding of our role in assessing the safety and security of new nuclear power station designs, and how we are progressing against our overall timeframe.
As part of the Nuclear Installations Inspectorate’s (NII) drive to increase the pace of GDA, we are placing work packages with contractors to help us carry out our detailed technical assessment of new nuclear power station designs. We established a framework agreement, including 31 Technical Support Contractors, across a range of 15 technical areas using the Official Journal of the European Union (OJEU) process.
GE-Hitachi writes to both HSE and the Environment Agency requesting the regulators temporarily suspend their assessment of the ESBWR nuclear power station design. As a result, both regulators suspend assessment work on the ESBWR.
HSE and the Environment Agency announce that they are starting the next, more detailed stage of the assessment process for the remaining three designs.
Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd (AECL) announces that it is withdrawing its ACR 1000 design from the assessment process.
HSE and the Environment Agency announce that their initial assessment of four new nuclear power stations designs found no shortfalls at this stage.
HSE and the Environment Agency complete their initial assessment of four nuclear power station designs:
As part of our work to assess the nuclear power stations designs currently going through our Generic Design Assessment (GDA) process, we need to tell them if we judge that a particular feature of the design might not meet UK regulatory standards. We do this by raising regulatory issues.
