Fuel Cycle Area
The Fuel Cycle Area (FCA) is the high security area within the licensed site, housing the facilities that historically handled and stored the site’s nuclear material and waste. Most of the buildings were built during the early construction phase of the site (1955-1959).
The fast reactor fuel cycle took place in the buildings which were linked together by a common corridor. These facilities were used for the manufacture of fuel elements, post-irradiation examination of irradiated fuel, fuel reprocessing, waste holding and treatment, and analytical services and research in laboratories.
The facilities are being systematically decommissioned. This involves the initial post-operational clean-out, decontamination and dismantling of the facilities followed by final demolition and environmental restoration.
Some of the facilities continue to operate, holding, managing and processing historical wastes. New facilities have been built to process historical wastes and to manage wastes arising from the decommissioning of the site. These include the Cementation plant and the Waste Supercompaction plant. These in turn will be decommissioned and demolished once their job is complete.
The decommissioning work is managed by DSRL and carried out by a flexible skilled team comprising of DSRL and contractors' decomissioning operatives. Specialist contractors are used for activities such as asbestos removal and non-nuclear demolition.
Decommissioning successes to date include:
Complete decommissioning and demolition of:
- Fuel fabrication plant
- Plutonium criticality research facility
- HEU waste store
- Analytical laboratories and cells
- Uranium criticality research facility
- Active workshops
- Inactive laundry
- Sodium experimental facility
- Silo cover building
- 25 inactive infrastructure facilities
Partial decommissioning of:
- Nuclear fuel reprocessing plants
- Nuclear fuel ponds
- Nuclear fuel PIE facilities
- Pulsed column laboratory
- Uranium recovery plant
- Low level waste handling facility
- Redundant remote handled intermediate level waste store
- Analytical laboratories and cells
- Dounreay Materials Test Reactor
- Redundant ventilation plant
Latest news update
- Subsea robot dives into nuclear clean-up - January 2010
- 'Daunting' clean-up project completes on time - January 2010
- Flask goes as full-scale decommissioning of plant begins - December 2009
- Building clean out detects historic nuclear material - December 2009
- Dirty cell clean up goes through the roof - November 2009
- Cillit Bang cleans up old plutonium plant - August 2009
- NDA: Criticality cell clean up a real triumph - July 2009
- Eight-ton fans will drive fuel plants clean-up - May 2009
- Household glass cleaner helps decommissioners clean up - April 2009
- NDA Director impressed by demolition progress - March 2009
- New stacks change the skyline at Dounreay - March 2009
- Plutonium cell reduced to rubble - March 2009
- New stacks set to rise above Dounreay - February 2009
- Skyline change at Dounreay as facility is demolished - February 2009
- 'Great achievement' says director as fuel pond is cleaned out - December 2008
- Fuel crushing plant is dismantled - October 2008
- Largest lab comes apart - October 2008
- Drillers clear way for robots to begin fuel cells clean-up - October 2008
- Jobs joy for 100 on major ventilation contract - October 2008
- Demolition of 'atomic factory' broadcast on internet - July 2008
- Old reprocessing plant is broken up - June 2008
The steel lining of the plutonium criticality cell is cut up by hand
Workers in protective suits dismantle a glovebox in one of the analytical laboratories
Demolishing a wall in the plutonium criticality research facility
A worker using remote manipulators
Plutonium criticality cell pit removal
Demolition of the fuel fabrication plant
A drum in the Dounreay Cementation Plant
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