Sellafield Ltd and the UK Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA) announced last week that the Sellafield site’s Thermal Oxide Reprocessing Plant (Thorp) has completed its 24-year mission to reprocess used nuclear fuel from around the world.
"Thorp will continue to serve the UK until the 2070s as a storage facility for spent fuel,” the statement said. The plant was opened in 1994 and remains one of only two commercial nuclear fuel reprocessing plants in the world (the other being Orano’s La Hague in France). Thorp has reprocessed more than 9000t of fuel from 30 customers in nine countries around the world and generated an estimated £9bn ($11.5bn) in revenue. The last batch of fuel to be reprocessed began its journey through the plant on 9 November. There will be no redundancies and all employees in roles no longer required have been offered alternative jobs, according to the statement.
Meanwhile, Sellafield is being reinvented as a centre of expertise for nuclear cleanup. “This will unlock 100 years’ worth of opportunity for the site’s workforce, supply chain, and community. Sellafield Ltd CEO Paul Foster said: “The end of reprocessing at Thorp is one of the most important events in Sellafield’s history. Thorp has been a West Cumbrian success story. It has delivered jobs, skills, pride, and prestige."
Thorp is one-third of a mile long and dominates a huge central strip of the Sellafield site. It is the largest structure on the site and costing £1.8bn to build, “paid for by its future customers”. The decision to cease reprocessing was taken in 2012 “in response to a significant downturn in demand”.
