Sellafield Ltd has responsibility for managing the Sellafield nuclear licensed site on the West Cumbrian coast. The site has a history of over 60 years of industrial activity, starting with its wartime development as an explosives factory and moving on to cover an extensive range of nuclear processing and power generation operations.  At certain points in time this industrial activity has affected the quality of land on parts of the site and one of the main tasks for Sellafield Ltd is to understand, control and manage the legacy of ground contamination to ensure protection of the workforce, the public and the environment. Much work has been done on this in the past and the purpose of this website is to explain the issues being tackled and to outline the current work being undertaken with the aim of stimulating interest and feedback for the future programme.    

Website Structure

Pages on this website give a background to the Sellafield site, its setting, its history, the current understanding of the land quality, the management approach and the current programme of work.  As far as possible they are written in non-technical language but links are provided to relevant reports for those interested in greater detail on particular topics.  As work progresses, new information or plans for future work will be placed on News pages and opportunities provided for comment or feedback. Links are also given to other websites and sources of supporting information.

Recent Developments

Groundbreaking Achievement

2009 saw the completion of a major milestone, which will lead to a better understanding of the underground legacy of over 60 years of industrial activity at Sellafield. After a year and a half of work on site, the final metres have been drilled in the current programme of borehole investigation work for the Sellafield Contaminated Land and Groundwater Management Project (SCL&GMP).

The project began in 2007 when a structured programme of work was initiated to develop and calibrate a model of ground water flow on the Sellafield Site which could be used to underpin future land quality programmes of work.

To collect the data to calibrate the model, the Project Team have completed a 3124 metre drilling programme with 138 permanent ground water installations.

The potential for contamination of land and groundwater in this area is currently an item of uncertainty with regards to liability cost estimates for the Sellafield Site. This work will enable future estimates to be made with greater confidence. It will also support ongoing safety and environmental management and aid the development of strategy and planning for the future.

The programme is scheduled to continue for another year to analyse soil and water samples, test groundwater flow and produce computer models to predict the future significance of the results.

Chris Halliwell, Project Superintendent for Decommissioning Zones 2 & 3 commented: “This is a very important project for the site; we have a duty of care for our employees, regulators and the local community to take the necessary steps to ensure we successfully manage the environmental legacy of historical operations on site.”

Phil Reeve, Head of Contaminated Land added; “This programme of work will help us to develop a much more comprehensive understanding of the land quality on the Sellafield Site and will provide a robust basis for determining how we plan to manage the clean-up of the site.”

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Land Quality Management Groundwater Annual Report 2010

This report covers the results of analyses of groundwater samples collected over the period April 2009 through March 2010.

The document can be found under the Groundwater Monitoring section.