Health and Safety
Executive / Commission
Nuclear
LLC reports
This report is issued as part of the Health and Safety Executive's commitment to make information about inspection and regulatory activities relating to the above site available to the public. It is for distribution to members of the Harwell Chilton Campus Local Stakeholder Group (LSG) and covers activities associated with the regulation of safety at the UKAEA Harwell licensed site. These reports are distributed quarterly. Site Inspectors of HM Nuclear Installations Inspectorate normally attend LSG meetings and will be happy to respond to questions raised there by members of the LSG. Any other person wishing to inquire about matters covered by this report should contact the HSE, Nuclear Safety Directorate Information Centre on 0151-951-3484.
Nuclear Directorate
Health and Safety Executive
Redgrave Court
Merton Road
Bootle
Merseyside
L20 7HS
1. Work on the proposed Harwell/Winfrith reorganisation into Research Sites Restoration Ltd, RSRL continued to be the focus of the Site Inspector’s attention this quarter. He made two visits to site, one of which was a joint shadow readiness and engineering capability inspection which was undertaken by a team of NII specialist inspectors in conjunction with inspectors from the Environment Agency. His other inspections and discussions dealt with a number of topics including land remediation, radioactive waste management and care and maintenance.
2. Further information on matters of interest is provided in the following sections of this report.
3. The Site Inspector’s inspections or discussions on specific operating plant raised no matters of immediate concern. On the matter of the MTR reactors which are currently under care and maintenance, he learned that both Dido and Pluto were put into care and maintenance while still containing a great many of the experimental rigs which were irradiated in the reactors while they were still operational. All the associated operational flasks are now redundant and the eventual removal and processing of the rigs into a passively safe form in the longer term will occur long after the closure of the active handling building next year and will require a strategy and supporting safety case to be submitted to NII.
4. The meetings help maintain close contact with the site whilst reducing travel time and costs. They are not seen as a substitute for site inspection visits but they allow routine regulatory business to proceed while the Site Inspector is away from the site. The Site Inspector was on site at the time of the July meeting which he consequently attended.
5. NII is currently reviewing its strategy for regulating decommissioning programmes, including those at Harwell and Winfrith. The strategy is likely to shift from one that expects decommissioning to be carried out “as soon as is reasonably practicable” to one which requires licensees to show that plant and buildings will be adequately safe throughout any period of decommissioning deferral. This revised approach is likely to mean that NII’s earlier Approvals of parts of Harwell’s and Winfrith’s decommissioning programmes are unlikely to be carried forward under the new site licences for DSRL. Instead, NII is likely to approve the Licensee’s new change control process for its decommissioning milestones. This will provide for DSRL to inform NII of any proposed significant changes to decommissioning milestones and enable NII to seek safety justifications as appropriate.
6. In September, the Site Inspector supported a joint shadow readiness and engineering capability inspection which was undertaken by a team of NII specialist inspectors in conjunction with inspectors from the Environment Agency. We found that, in general, shadow working remained the appropriate position for UKAEA in its stage-wise reorganisation to RSRL ahead of the relicensing planned for February next year. We found evidence of good practice and adequate preparation throughout our inspection but we also identified a number of areas where it was appropriate for UKAEA to undertake further work prior to the licensing of RSRL. We judged that while licensing remained on course for February, further clarity in, and completeness of, UKAEA’s preparations was necessary. Accordingly, we sought close-out of the work in question either prior to or during a December.
7.NII has powers under Nuclear Site Licence Number 44 to issue Consents, Approvals and Directions. In addition, NII can issue Notifications, Specifications, Acknowledgements and Agreements under the conditions attached to the Licence, or under arrangements made by UKAEA for complying with those conditions.
A new numbering system was introduced on 1 October 2004 for site licence actions, and all such actions are now called Licence Instruments.
No Licence Instrument was issued during quarter three.