BNS Nuclear Services wins £13m Dounreay contract

London -BNS Nuclear Services has won a £13-million open book contract from Dounreay Site Restoration Ltd. (DSRL) to provide maintenance and operations services in support of the decommissioning the site’s two fast reactors. The contract is expected to run for three years, with an option to extend by up to two years. Until now, four different companies have provided maintenance and operations support at the reactors.

The appointment of BNS will bring together under one management the work previously done by the four companies. Brad Smith, DSRL's site project manager commented: “Even though our reactors are of different designs, there is a great deal of commonality about the decommissioning approach needed for liquid, alkali-metal-cooled, fast reactors. This contract should act as a pilot study to show we can take advantage of this.”

Mike Brown, DSRL's fast reactors decommissioning manager and the contract’s corporate sponsor, explained: “We needed to make a change and I believe this is the right thing to do. As we move towards combining work on our two reactors, rather than having separate teams for each, it makes sense too to combine the old contracts. If BNS is able to deliver the efficiencies we expect, then this business model could be adopted for wider business integration.”

Central to this challenge is the combining of the two reactor workforces who each have specialist knowledge. This means not only sharing knowledge and skills built up over the years, but also managing the inevitable culture change. At the heart of this process is the development and implementation of a common electronic works control system. The safety issues surrounding this are critical, so BNS is expected to develop an integrated planning system for the reactors’ maintenance and operations activities. Once up and running, the system should be able to give performance statistics, such as how long individual maintenance tasks are likely to take, further aiding task planning. With just one contractor responsible for the planning process, it is expected that DRSL will benefit from the economies of scale that should flow when both operations and maintenance tasks are combined by the same team.

BNS’s site agent David Hubbard said: “Our team has proposed a programme of short and medium-term improvements to create a more streamlined work flow. We have already begun work and intend our team to put in place demonstrable improvements, while meeting all the safety requirements associated with the site licence conditions.”