Sellafield waste team has 50,000 reasons to celebrate

A team at the heart of Sellafield’s clean-up mission has hit a momentous milestone. Some of the RER team in front of the encapsulation plants and product storage facilities on the Sellafield site. The Sellafield site’s Retrievals East River (RER) has just received, treated, and sent for storage its 50,000th intermediate level waste package. Retrievals East River plays a crucial role in the decommissioning of Sellafield and helps keeps the lights on across the UK. It takes intermediate level waste from Sellafield’s legacy plants and deals with remnants of spent fuel from the UK’s Advanced Gas-cooled Reactors (AGRs.) The AGR programme provided RER’s 50,000th package: a graphite filled waste drum. Lee Metcalf, head of RER operations, said: "I’m proud to be part of a team that, for more than 3 decades, has safely received and processed intermediate level waste into a disposal form. Reaching this milestone is down to the dedication and hard work of everyone involved. In processing these 50,000 packages, we’ve used an impressive 12,000 m³ or 24,000 tons of grout. That’s enough to fill 5 Olympic swimming pools or pack 120 double-decker buses!" Alyson Armett, head of retrievals value stream, said: "Even though reprocessing operations have ended, RER continues to play a vital role in UK energy generation by accepting waste from fuel dismantling, helping to keep the lights on across the country. We’re also contributing to the ongoing site-wide clean-up of our most hazardous facilities, like the Magnox Swarf Storage Silo. Originally, the silo waste was meant for the Box Encapsulation Plant, but with this plant not operational until 2027, RER has adapted its facilities to accept this waste in the meantime." RER processes waste from a variety of sources using innovative technology to ensure it is safely stored until its final disposal in a Geological Disposal Facility.