Analytical Support for the Decommissioning Design Process

British Nuclear Group are part of the BNFL group. They provide specialist nuclear site management, decommissioning and clean-up services. They are the primary contractor and site management company to the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority in the UK.

The Challenge
As part of the decommissioning of the UK Hunterston-A Nuclear Power Plant, British Nuclear Group - Project Services, are responsible for the retrieval of nuclear waste from a series of ‘Waste Bunkers’ and moving packages into an off-site secure storage area.

The objective of the simulation project was to simulate the process of movement of this waste, analyzing the various elements of the process to challenge and validate the design, and the use of equipment within it.

The Solution
The simulation model was particularly complex, in that each of the millions of pieces of waste had unique characteristics, determining for example how it could be handled, and the volume each part takes up in removal & storage. This had significant implications on the number and type of equipment required for each stage in the process and it had a significant impact on the time the removal project would take to complete.

SIMUL8 allowed design engineers to test, validate and alter their design where appropriate, ensuring that the optimal balance between resource cost and timescale to completion were achieved.

SIMUL8 Corp. was responsible for working with key British Nuclear Group - Project Services employees to gather the relevant data to populate the simulation, giving engineers the level of analysis that they required.

The Result
The SIMUL8 team offered support to the design engineers in identifying and carrying out ‘what-if ’ scenarios on the process, with the objective of achieving a reasonable trade-off between the time taken to carry out the process, and the required resources.

“I was extremely impressed with SIMUL8 Corporation. Their ability to understand our requirements, and design & build a solution in significantly less time than the alternative options, was fundamental to the success of the project. Furthermore, upon delivery our in-house engineers found the SIMUL8 product easier to use, and I therefore look forward to working with them on future projects.”

Andy Carr, Head of Engineering Support, British Nuclear Group

Dave Ramsey,
Principal Transport Planner Hertfordshire Highways