Case Studies

Title

Date

Brief description

De-licensing of the Harwell site. A case study prepared for SAFEGROUNDS+. Issue 2.2

July 2012

This case study covers the final site clearance and delicensing of parts of the Harwell nuclear site. Harwell is further advanced with delicensing than any of the other NDA sites, so SAFEGROUNDS+ members judged that a case study would help other licensees and communities who will be going through the process in due course.

Investigation of concerns of enriched uranium contamination at Hinkley Point. A case study prepared for SAFEGROUNDS+. Draft 2.2

July 2012

This case study covers the 2011 investigation of concerns of enriched uranium contamination at Hinkley Point. It was commissioned as a result of constructive discussion between pressure groups and regulators at a SAFEGROUNDS+ meeting and its purpose is to explore how concerns can be or should be raised and resolved, and the conditions for “joint fact finding” to work.

Application of the SAFEGROUNDS Key Principles and guidance to management of the very low level waste disposal area at Hunterston A Site

November 2011

The land owned by the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority at Hunterston A includes an area reclaimed from the foreshore of the Firth of Clyde using mainly soil and rock excavated during the construction of the Hunterston A and B power stations. This "foreshore reclaimed area" lies outside the Nuclear Licensed Site, and includes a small area used for disposal of very low-level solid radioactive waste in the late 1970s and early 1980s, which is the subject of this case study.

This is a 2011 update of the only SAFEGROUNDS case study to illustrate the application of SAFEGROUNDS key principles and guidance through all three stages of the SAFEGROUNDS process flow diagram, from the Risk Assessment stage (including immediate action) through Options Appraisal to the Adopting Remediation Strategy (implementation) stage. The main case study document is supported by presentation slides (referenced by number in the main document) and a referenced non-technical summary of the strategic options appraisal.

Characterisation of the Dounreay castle site using the groundhog system

Dounreay Castle is located at the mouth of the Mill Lade at the northern boundary of the UKAEA Dounreay site. As a result of past operations at the UKAEA Dounreay site the castle environs were affected by radioactive contamination. The two sources of contamination identified were effluent dispersion experiments carried out in the mid-1950s and leakage of the low-radioactive drainage system.

Remediation of a radioactively and chemically contaminated site at Harwell

The Southern Storage Area (SSA) comprises an area of land covering some 7.2 ha, approximately 1 km south of the UKAEA Harwell, Oxfordshire.The SSA was used by the RAF until 1945 as an ammunition store. From 1946 the site was used for a variety of waste storage and handling operations and for the permanent landfill burial of mixed chemical, beryllium and low-level radioactive waste (LLW).

A preliminary clean-up of the site was carried out during 1988-1990, to eliminate the need for the site to be licensed under the Nuclear Installations Act (as was required for the main Harwell site). However, this remediation was not sufficient to allow unrestricted access to the site, which remained secure.