New Treatment And Conditioning Framework Worth £41Million

9th July 2022

Nuclear Waste Services has awarded a four-year framework contract worth up to £41 million to three suppliers for the treatment and conditioning of radioactive waste.

The new service has been hailed as offering additional value to radioactive waste producers as in addition to the core elements of incineration and supercompaction routinely used to dispose of waste streams, it will also enable access to a wide range of other technologies such as encapsulation and de-tritiation.

The Framework has been awarded to Inutec Ltd, trading as Tradebe Inutec, Veolia ES UK Ltd, and PermaFix Environmental Services Inc.

Dr Craig Ashton, Waste Services Director at NWS, said, "This Framework marks the continued evolution of our service offering to customers as part of a longer-term strategy for generating even greater value and enabling mission acceleration.

As always, the team have done a fantastic job in getting it ready so that service delivery continues without disruption.

The contract builds on the success of an existing Waste Treatment Services Framework, operating for four years, and the focus remains, where possible, on providing treatment processes that enable the diversion of waste from the Repository.

The Framework can provide a service covering the full waste lifecycle, including but not limited to, project management, expert advice, characterisation, site preparations, dismantling, transport, segregation, treatment, conditioning and optimised disposal.

About Nuclear Waste Services
Introducing Nuclear Waste Services
Nuclear Waste Services brings together the UK's leading nuclear waste management capabilities.

We have integrated the expertise of Low Level Waste Repository (LLWR), Radioactive Waste Management (RWM), and the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA) group's Integrated Waste Management Programme (IWMP). This creates an organisation focused on the management of the UK's nuclear waste, safely and securely for generations to come.

We are part of the NDA group, which is undertaking the biggest clean-up project in Europe over many decades. Nuclear Waste Services is integral to this environmental clean-up mission, as we work to provide permanent answers to our country's nuclear waste. The UK has been producing and managing radioactive waste on an industrial scale since the 1940s. However, today's approach and capabilities for waste management need to adapt to keep pace with NDA's decommissioning ambitions. This includes its commitment to recycle 50% of waste from decommissioning and reduce secondary wastes by around 70% by 2030.

Coming together as a single business provides an integrated way of tackling waste of the past, while offering more sustainable and efficient services to waste producers, now and in the future.

We want Nuclear Waste Services to be a great place to work where everybody is action orientated, ambitious, collaborative and acts with integrity. It will combine the talent of our people and give them an environment in which to thrive. Not only will this be good for our people, but also allow Nuclear Waste Services to grow its capability even further. We will be driven by doing the right thing for our people, customers, partners, and the communities where we operate to ensure all our operations are safe and secure.

Our key commitments

We will be a safe and responsible business
We will be customer and community focused
We will develop capabilities
About us
We are specialists in the treatment and disposal of nuclear waste. Our goal is to ensure that waste is managed in a way that protects people and the environment, now and in the future.

A customer and community focused business with safety at its core

A great place to work, where people are respected, included and can perform at their best

A centre of excellence to drive and deliver value for the taxpayer

Our vision
Securing a safer future for us all.

Our mission
Protecting people and the environment by managing the UK's nuclear waste innovatively and sustainably.

Our work
Nuclear Waste Services will build on work delivered over many decades, while adding more essential services for customers in the nuclear energy, defence, industrial, medical, and research sectors.

We'll draw on years of innovation by LLWR, where a full range of specialist skills and solutions - waste characterisation, treatment, recycling, volume reduction, packaging, and disposal - have been developed.

This has optimised the lifetime of the repository. Waste is only disposed directly at the repository site if it cannot be diverted for alternative treatment and disposal.

Developing a Geological Disposal Facility (GDF) for the permanent disposal of higher activity radioactive wastes is a strategic imperative, and represents one of the UK’s largest environmental and infrastructure programmes. The UK search for a suitable site is, uniquely, based on consent from a willing community and includes a right to withdraw from the process right up until a test of public support.

One of our commitments is to work with waste producers to overcome a range of challenges and to capitalise on new opportunities. We will do this by thinking differently about waste and enabling a flexible approach to long-term waste management.

The IWMP has been charged with this work, creating, and developing new approaches and defining the appropriate implementation routes. This will be crucial for delivering more efficiency, greater speed and lower costs.

Nuclear Waste Services will continue to put the voice of our people, customers, communities, and supply chain at the heart of everything we do.

What we do
Major Capital Programmes (Project developer)
Managing the delivery of large-scale capital projects, with an initial focus on a GDF. This involves working with communities to find a suitable site and a willing community to host the GDF.

Waste Operations (Nuclear site license operator)
Responsible for managing and operating sites, like the repository, that fall within the remit of Nuclear Waste Services. The focus is on the safe, compliant, and effective management of waste management infrastructure.

Waste Services (Service provider)
Working with customers to provide waste management services and solutions to address their challenges. As well as providing advice and expertise, we manage contracts and relationships across the waste cycle.

Integrated Waste Management Programme
Developing new waste management capability and opportunities to work group-wide as part of a broader integration programme to underpin the NDA’s and nation’s strategy of a more joined-up approach to waste management.

Enabling Functions
Supporting functions include commercial, communications and stakeholder relations, environmental, health, safety, security and quality (EHSSQ), finance, human resources and legal. These ensure high standards are maintained, and the business has the right resources and processes to deliver effectively and efficiently.

See our corporate brochure Introducing Nuclear Waste Services for more information.

Nuclear Waste Services (NWS) is a joint trading name of both LLW Repository Limited (LLWR) and Radioactive Waste Management Limited (RWM).

NWS is a division of the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA) which includes RWM and LLWR. NWS is not a legal entity but provides strategic oversight over the operation and development of these businesses through a management board governance structure.

Nuclear Waste Services

The UK's nuclear history
Putting geological disposal into context