The Pile Fuel Storage Pond (PFSP) at 100 metres in length and 25 metres in diameter is the largest open air nuclear storage pond in the world and the oldest at Sellafield.
Built and commissioned between 1948 – 1952 it was originally constructed for the receipt and storage of fuel and isotopes from the Windscale Piles, which were two nuclear reactors that operated in the 1950s on the Windscale site (now known as Sellafield).
Following the closure of the Windscale Piles and commissioning of the First-Generation Magnox Fuel Storage Pond, PFSP operations were scaled down, although the facility remained in use as a storage facility for some materials.
The pond has an historic inventory of waste that includes fuel, sludge, radioactive and contaminated solids, Intermediate Level Waste (ILW) and Low-Level Waste (LLW), pond water and contaminated concrete.
Since the start of retrievals a significant amount of waste has been removed. Due to the volume of waste that has been removed the facility is now in ‘enhanced’ regulatory attention, unlike FGMSP, MSSS and PFCS which remain in ‘significantly enhanced’ attention.
In 2023 we permissioned the use of divers in bays 11 and 12 of the pond to help remove waste that was becoming increasingly difficult to retrieve using established clearing techniques.
Once the full waste inventory has been removed, the pond will be dewatered and eventually demolished.