Health and Safety
Executive / Commission
Nuclear
LLC reports
The 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 Dounreay Site Stakeholder Group (DSSG) and covers activities associated with the regulation of safety at Dounreay. These reports are distributed quarterly. Site Inspectors of HM Nuclear Installations Inspectorate normally attend the Dounreay SSG meetings and will be happy to respond to questions raised there or subsequently by members of the Dounreay SSG. Any other person wishing to inquire about matters covered by this report should contact the HSE, Nuclear Directorate on 0151-951-3484/3290
This report will be put onto the HSE Website under ‘Local Liaison Committee Reports’ at www.hse.gov.uk/nuclear/llc/index.htm
Site Inspectors and Specialist Inspectors visited Dounreay on the following dates:
During the inspection visit carried out in May, the NII Site Inspectors were accompanied by an observer from Japan’s Nuclear & Industrial Safety Agency . participated.
Compliance inspections were undertaken against a number of the Licence Conditions. No major issues were raised.
NII Site Inspectors and Specialist Inspectors have continued to assess the relatively high safety cat egory decommissioning projects at PFR and DFR ( eg . NaK disposal and breeder/fuel removal) with a view to permissioning these projects in due course.
Resource constraints within NII has continued to prevent close out of the audit recommendations, but there has been some progress in gaining agreement to close a number of the long-term recommendations. Where appropriate, UKAEA has agreed to provide progress reports to NII.
NII has continued to monitor UKAEA’s progress in restructuring its the Dounreay Division. Adverse trends have been noted including: reduced rate of closure of corrective actions by UKAEA management; increased sickness and resignation rates and increases in overtime worked.
In response to a request from NII, UKAEA has provided information on a number of posts that have specific responsibilities for health and safety, emergency arrangements and radioactive waste management, and which have been affected by the restructuring. The information has included the competence requirements for the posts and a gap analysis for the new incumbents.
NII Inspectors witnessed the Dounreay emergency An exercise on 17 th May . Whilst t he exercise was cons id ered to be a successful demonstration of the site emergency arrangements, a few areas for improvement were identified .
Following the spillage of a batch of MTR raffinate onto a cell floor in September 2005, NII received satisfactory responses to the two Improvement Notices served on UKAEA in November 2005. Inspectors continued to monitor the decontamination activities at DCP and the preparations for personnel entry to the shielded cell to ensure that any radiation exposure to workers is as low as reasonably practicable.
On 23 rd /24 th April, failures of a gasket, a bund wall and a drain pipe resulted in a leakage of water that had been decanted from the shaft containing a small quantity of radioactive material. The radiation dose received by the workers involved in recovery operations was below the level of regulatory concern. NII has written to UKAEA outlining its expectations for the prevention of a recurrence of this event and requesting a root cause analysis.
During a routine tour of building D2670 by UKAEA management on 8 th June, it was discovered that about 4.5 litres of acid containing dissolved PFR fuel had leaked from piping attached to two small vessels onto the stainless steel cladding of a shielded cell. The radioactive material was completely contained within the shielded cell and because of the quantity of material involved in the leak, there was no risk of a criticality event. NII’s subsequent inspection concluded that the piping design, which included compression fittings and valves, had only been appropriate for short-term experimental work. The raffinate had been stored in these vessels since 1990.
The cell has been decontaminated and the raffinate has been recovered. UKAEA is planning to encapsulate the raffinate in cement.
15. The Inspectorate has powers under the licence to issue Consents, Approvals and Directions. In addition, the Inspectorate uses Licence Instruments to issue Specifications, Acknowledgements, and Agreements under either the conditions attached to the Licence, or arrangements made by UKAEA for complying with those conditions.
| LI No. 522 | A Specification under UKAEA’s arrangements that active commissioning of the Dounreay Cementation Plant Import Export Facility should not proceed without the agreement of the Health & Safety Executive. |
| LI No. 523 | An agreement to the reclassification of the Dounreay Research Reactor Fuel Reprocessing Plant . |
| LI No.524 | An a gree ment to the commencement of inactive commissioning of the NaK Disposal Plant was issued to UKAEA on 30th June . |