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Decommissioning of historic waste store progressing well
Work to construct an engineered overbuilding on one of Sellafield’s historic beta gamma waste stores which will allow waste retrieval operations to commence, has taken another major step forward.
Work to install the operations floor was completed at the end of January and since then 80% of the main overbuilding structural steelwork has now been completed.
In addition, the new runway beams (seen in yellow on the photo) which will support hoists for the retrieval operations have also now been installed.
The waste store, within the site’s Separation Area, was constructed in 1951 to support the management of low active effluent arising from early reprocessing operations on the Sellafield site.
The original facility contains eight open-top, above ground cells. From the 1970s, the cells were identified as suitable containment for the storage of miscellaneous beta gamma (low and intermediate level) waste including items such as filters, pipework and scaffolding. The process of storing waste in this way continued through to 2000.
"Due to the age, integrity of the storage and nature of the inventory, the cells were deemed unsuitable for long term storage," said Adrian Long, project manager.
"A project was therefore initiated in 2004 to construct a facility that would provide a new engineered building with operations floor and electrical services (power, lighting, environmental monitoring and fire detection capability) that will enable us to begin waste characterisation and retrieval operations."
The next phase of the project will be to clad the outer shell of the facility – which is due to begin in April.
For more information on this project please click here.
