Exempt Waste

Waste is the product of decommissioning.

Dounreay Site Restoration Ltd keeps the amount of waste generated to a minimum. It adopts vigorous controls to prevent or reduce waste arising in the first place, and recycles it whenever practicable.

Dounreay’s management of radioactive waste is regulated under the Radioactive Substances Act. Historically, all waste generated in areas where radioactive materials are present was managed under these regulations and processed as radioactive waste. 

Recent developments in the segregation of waste and improvements in monitoring techniques have enabled significant reductions to be made in the volume of waste that needs to be managed in this way.

This has allowed waste to be treated more appropriately, as waste that is exempt from the requirements of the Radioactive Substance Act.

Treating this waste as exempt from the regulatory controls governing radioactive waste has environmental and financial benefits. It allows the waste to be recycled or, where this is not feasible, consigned to industrial landfill instead of a radioactive waste depository.

Waste that falls into this category will emit less radiation than naturally-ocurring radioactivity found in everyday things like coffee beans, bananas or rocks.

A good example of this is waste from building excavations. In 2005, the new waste segregation procedures were tested on more than 1600 one-tonne bags of excavated material that had accumulated at the site and been categorised previously as low level waste. More than 550 were found to be below the threshold for low level waste and therefore exempt.

More recently, over 9600 tonnes of exempt spoil has been recycled as aggregate for new construction at the site. This prevented its transportation to landfill for disposal, and avoided the need to source primary aggregate.

The new practices now in place at Dounreay have enabled project teams to forecast, characterise and manage their wastes more efficiently. These new arrangements reflect an industry-wide code of practice and are enshrined in an environmental management system accredited independently by EAQA.

In 2006/07, 906 tonnes of waste exempt from the Radioactive Substances Act was removed from the site for disposal. In 2007/08, the total was 419 tonnes.

DSRL believes it can increase further the amount of exempt material, particularly scrap metals, that can be recycled, so reducing the amount it sends to landfill.

Dounreay rubble to be recycled in site remediation - July 2010
 

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Image:

Exempt waste is sorted in a dedicated compound at the site

Image: A lot of waste from controlled areas of the site does not need to be processed as normal radioactive waste

Waste categorised as exempt is checked

Image: A lot of waste from controlled areas of site does not need to be processed as radioactive waste

A lot of waste from controlled areas of site does not need to be processed as radioactive waste

Image: Waste is checked to ensure it meets the criteria for exempt

Waste is checked to ensure it meets the criteria for exempt

Image: A worker handles exempt waste

A worker handles exempt waste