Radiation Protection Today - Winter 2022 Issue 4 | Page 13

Decommissioning Progress at Sellafield Site

Typical Calibration Source
Sellafield site is the largest nuclear facility in Europe . From its origins as a factory for the production of plutonium ( Windscale ), the facility grew to become the UK
centre of nuclear reprocessing and is also home to the world ' s first commercial nuclear power station ( Calder Hall ). SRP President-Elect Jennifer Humphries works for the site licence holder , Sellafield Ltd , as an RPA in the Corporate Radiation Protection Team . In this article , she describes recent progress made in decommissioning some of the legacy facilities .
This year , Sellafield Ltd has made a significant step towards decommissioning a high hazard facility . The first waste from the Magnox Swarf Storage Silo ( MSSS ) was removed into an engineered container which was processed through to Encapsulated Product Stores ( EPS ) for longterm storage .
The MSSS was used to store Magnox Swarf , a product of reprocessing activities from the 1960s until the 1990s , after which such waste was diverted to the Encapsulation plants to be encapsulated in concrete . It also stores Miscellaneous Beta Gamma Waste , which is more inert and was selected for the first retrievals . There were radiation protection issues with the originally planned retrievals process , which was designed in the 1990s , leading to long delays in implementation . Plans for waste processing were therefore changed . The waste is now being stored in EPS and will move to the Box Encapsulation Plant Product Store Direct Import Facility when it is commissioned .
Pile Fuel Storage Pond ( PFSP ) external area
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