The UK’s Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) wants to expand its capacity for assessing new nuclear technologies. The need arises because it is anticipating that over a five-year period at least five industry applications will be received for Regulatory Justification, although that figure “may increase or decrease as interest in nuclear energy generation evolves”. It is considering options for procuring expert consultancy services to support the assessments, which it says are expected to be in the order of one or two applications per year.
Defra is Justifying Authority under the Justification of Practices Involving Ionising Radiation Regulations 2004 (1769/2004), which require functional separation between the Department of Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ), which is the UK government department promoting nuclear technology, and Defra as the Justifying Authority. Defra says the services will be required from late 2024 or early 2025. It has begun a market engagement exercise in advance of a planned £8.8m (US$XXm) tender.
The option to approach the market with a tender for a dedicated multi-supplier framework is being considered alongside other potential routes to market. The market engagement exercise aims to better understand the interest, capability and capacity of the supply market to provide these services in any future invitation to tender.
Examples of the type of services expected to be required include ongoing technical advisory, analytical and consultancy support throughout the multi-month assessment of a Justification application, or shorter projects which may involve written advice and assessments of the appropriacy of the definitions of a class or type of practice of new nuclear technologies, analysis of specific issues raised by consultation respondents or comparison of specific aspects of current and previous applications.
The duration of assessments will depend on the nature of the applications, but it is anticipated that external technical support may last for up to a period of approximately 19 months for each application.
Contractors will assess applications in respect of their important economic, energy security, carbon reduction and other benefits and on a wide range of detriments, which include radiological detriment to health, safety and security and environmental impacts, covering operation, waste disposal and decommissioning. As a result, they must offer:
- Economic analysis and appropriate knowledge of the energy sector, to enable effective assessment of how the class or type of practice contributes to the energy mix in UK policy.
- Broad and deep knowledge of nuclear energy sector, to enable effective assessment based on fully informed understanding of technologies.
- Expert formal consultancy advice, with a view to working in close partnership with Defra’s Nuclear Justification team.
The engagement exercise is also intended to help to inform decisions on how contractors will deliver the services (in-house, via sub-contractors, via a consortium or other operational structure) and the a structure (a capability matrix structure to break services down into discreet areas of specialism, or a single lot arrangement that would require contractors to be able to provide all the services in the specification to be eligible).
It will also consider conflict of interest that currently exists or may develop within the market and how this may be managed.
