Executive summary
- Inspection date(s): 8/11/22
Purpose of inspection
In accordance with the Office for Nuclear Regulation’s (ONR’s) Sellafield Strategy, each year ONR performs a series of planned compliance inspections of selected licence conditions, targeted at those facilities with significant importance to nuclear safety. One such inspection was performed to assess the Special Nuclear Materials (SNM) Value Stream’s compliance with Sellafield Limited’s corporate arrangements for Licence Condition (LC) 11 (Emergency arrangements).
The purpose of this intervention was for ONR to inspect the adequacy of implementation of the licensee’s formal arrangements for compliance with Licence Condition (LC) 11 (Emergency arrangements) by the SNM Value Stream. This inspection covered both SNM North (N) and SNM South (S) with a plant walk-down in SNM(N).
Subject(s) of inspection
The following actives were the subject of this inspection:
- LC11 - Emergency arrangements - Rating - Green
Key findings
The inspection comprised discussions with Sellafield Limited staff, review of records, and inspection of equipment and facilities on plant.
I found that SNM were maintaining local arrangements including Emergency Instructions.
I saw evidence that SNM were effectively planning and undertaking drills and exercises in line with the Corporate arrangements. This included evidence that SNM were learning from the drills and exercises.
SNM demonstrated, on a sample basis, that for the various shifts SNM personnel were Suitably Qualified and Experienced to undertake their Emergency Duty Team Roles.
During the plant walkdown I found that the primary and back-up Incident Control Centres, which are managed by a separate part of Sellafield Limited, contained the appropriate instructions, plans and drawings for SNM(N). One minor compliance shortfall was identified regarding the management of SNM(N) Access Control Point stores. I have not raised a Level 4 Regulatory Issue as SNM promptly addressed the matter.
Some minor opportunities for improvement were identified during the inspection that resulted in regulatory advice.
Judgements made
On the basis of the evidence sampled at the time of the inspection, I judge that Sellafield Limited has adequately implemented its arrangements for LC 11 in the SNM Value Stream. Noting the ONR guidance on inspection ratings, it is my opinion that an inspection rating of Green (no formal action) is appropriate.