The Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA) has awarded contracts totalling £30 million to drive innovation and research into new techniques to deliver safe, sustainable and cost-effective decommissioning.
Sellafield robot hand resized. Image Credit: Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA)
The NDA is cleaning up the UK’s oldest nuclear sites which were designed without decommissioning in mind, posing challenges which require first of a kind engineering and technological solutions.
Research is an essential part of decommissioning programme and each year the NDA group invest £100 million in Research & Development (R&D). The aim is to solve the challenging technical problems more effectively, more efficiently, and, where possible, for less cost.
The NDA Research Portfolio (NRP) competition forms a key part of the NDA’s strategic research programme and provides direct funding for research that supports strategic objectives including growing and maintaining diverse skills within the supply chain and promoting innovation across multiple sites.
NDA Head of R&D, Kate Canning, said:
We are delighted with the high quality of the submissions received, including from many new organisations alongside those established in the nuclear sector.
It’s an exciting time for the nuclear industry and we believe the range of organisations involved in the frameworks will provide a diverse range of experience and knowledge to deliver innovative research supporting the delivery of the NDA mission.
The contracts will cover three areas:
- University Interactions; supporting academic research to grow skills within the nuclear decommissioning sector.
- Enabling Decommissioning, Waste Management and Remediation; underpinning research in radioactive waste management and decommissioning techniques and practice.
- Spent Fuels and Nuclear Material; enabling research in spent fuel storage and disposal and plutonium and uranics strategy development.
The seven successful consortia, involve over 60 organisations in total including established nuclear companies, global cross-sector corporations, UK universities, national laboratories, plus small and medium sized enterprises.
The three new contracts run for four years and replace the previous Direct Research Portfolio (DRP) awarded in 2020.
Previous successes as a result of the NRP include the development of new treatment technologies for uranic materials and the development of a non-contact asbestos detection system utilising hyperspectral techniques to support our decommissioning mission.
The NRP supports the NDA’s University Research Strategy and will also address cross-industry R&D requirements identified by the Nuclear Waste and Decommissioning Research Forum (NWDRF), a group that aims to enhance coordination of R&D and technical programmes across UK’s site decommissioning and remediation and integrated waste management activities.