The UK’s Sellafield Ltd and Nuclear Transport Solutions (NTS) are making preparations for the second return to Germany of high-level waste (HLW) in the form of vitrified residue.
The waste results from the reprocessing and recycling of used nuclear fuel at the Sellafield site in West Cumbria, which had previously been used to produce electricity by utilities in Germany. Vitrified residue returns are a key component of the UK Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA) strategy to repatriate HLW from the UK, fulfilling overseas contracts in line with government policy.
Sellafield Ltd works in partnership with NTS to return the waste to German customers. NTS, part of the NDA, will perform the shipments, drawing on 50 years’ experience of transporting nuclear materials safely and securely around the world.
The waste will be transported by sea on a specialist vessel to a German port, then onwards by rail to its final destination. The shipments will be carried out in full compliance with all applicable national and international regulations, and subject to issue of all relevant permits and licenses.
Seven flasks will be transported from Sellafield via a German port to the Isar Federal storage facility in the first half of 2025. This will be the second of three shipments from the UK to Germany. The first shipment of six flasks, to Biblis, was completed in 2020.
NTS works in partnership with Germany’s GNS Gesellschaft für Nuklear-Service mbH. In December, Germany’s Federal Office for the Safety of Nuclear Disposal (BASE – Bereichen der Forschung zur Sicherheit nuklearer Entsorgung) granted the necessary transport permit for the transport from Sellafield via an English and a German seaport and from there by rail to the state interim camp Isar (BZI) in Niederaichbach near Landshut.
GNS said the consignment will comprise seven CASTOR HAW28M safety containers designed for this purpose. For safety reasons, neither the transport date nor the exact transport route will be announced in advance. The federal BGZ Gesellschaft für Zwischenlagerung mbH, which operates the Isar interim storage facility, had already received the storage permit in April 2023 from BASE.
