Refurbished plant

The ACCORD Alliance has won a multi-million-pound contract for the refurbishment of an intermediate-level waste-storage plant at Sellafield, plus the design of a new adjoining building.

The ACCORD Alliance, which was created to support Sellafield Sites Limited and the Low Level Waste Repository, is made up of AMEC, Scott Wilson and BNS Nuclear Services.

Under the terms of the contract, Sellafield’s Box Encapsulation Plant Product Store (BEPPS) will be refurbished, while a new Comprehensive Import Export Facility (CIEF) will be built next to it.

The plant is scheduled to be completed in 2012 in line with the site Intermediate Level Waste (ILW) decommissioning strategy. The store is designed to hold ILW generated on the Sellafield site in specially produced containers, each with a design life of more than 100 years.

‘The alliance faces some exciting design challenges,' said Andy White, business unit director for AMEC’s nuclear business.

He added: ‘I am confident that the skills and expertise contained within the alliance will ensure that we deliver a first-class product to our client.’

Tony Moore, projects and operations director for BNS, said: ‘The deadlines we worked to on phases I and II were extremely tough but we delivered recognised quality, on time and to budget, and this was clearly a factor in the awarding of this phase.

‘Our teams will be working very closely with the client, principally on mechanical, C,E&I and stress analysis, and will be co-located.’

Work on the design pre study for the CIEF has already begun, with 30 people already working on the project.