Hunterston B power station declared ‘nuclear free’

The old Hunterston B power plant in Northern Ayrshire has been formally declared nuclear after three years of definition.

The site generated its final energy in January 2022 after 46 years of operation, two more decades than originally planned.

The sites any closure was sealed when line line cracks were found in graphite bricks that make up its nuclear nuclei.

The Edf Energy owners said that all Hunterston spent fuel had transported by train to Sellafield in cumbria for long -term storage.

The site will now be prepared for the delivery of nuclear restoration services that deals with the dismantling sites.

This is expected to happen in approximately one year.

Since it closed, 4,880 fuel elements of the two nuclear reactors have been eliminated.

After a period dedicated to cooling in ponds on the site, the elements were packaged in 350 large flasks for long -term storage.

Once the last one was eliminated, the inspectors of the office for nuclear regulation made checks before declaring the “Nuclear Free” energy station.

For autumn, the armed police patroling the highly sensitive site will be removed.

The station director, Andy Dalling, said the definition had been carried out on time and the budget with the approach now resorting to the delivery.

He said: “It is a significant internship. It allows us to move on to the second phase, which is deconstruction.

“Deconstruction is a great project and we believe it will last at least another decade.

“We are trying to take the site to a phase called ‘Safe Store’, which means that disassembling, demolition, carefully decontaminating the items on the site and then removing the site to a safe store.”

Mr. Dalling said that it would still be around 250 works highly qualified on the site during the next five to 10 years and that EDF had been trying to match the staff with their aspirations.

Some will remain and help work through the engineering challenges involved in the project.

Rachel Boyd, 28, from Ardrossan, joined as an apprentice and will remain in the site through dismantling.

She said: “Generations have worked here. Her grandparents build the station, her parents have worked here and now we have people who work here who are dismantling her.

“The station’s full life cycle has seen the full life cycle of the local area.”

Hunterston B is one of the seven advanced sites of gas -refrigerated reactors in the United Kingdom that growl the end of their lives.

Five are still generating electricity, including one in Torness near Dunbar in East Lothian, but three are in the process of being dismantled.

Last year, Torness had its life extended for two years until 2030 and the removal power plants will see an investment of £ 1.3 billion in all sites.

Nuclear restoration services, which deal with long -term dismantling sites, is effectively owned by the United Kingdom.

They are already the answers for more than the sites of the United Kingdom, such as Hunterston A, which closed in 1990, along with Dounreay on the north coast of Scotland.

The nuclear dismantling authority said that would continue to work with EDF to guarantee the transition without problems of the Hunterston B site.