Case Study: UKAEA Winfrith

Transcript

Alan Neal, Head of Site - UKAEA Winfrith
The Winfrith site is operated by the United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority.  We have been here since the mid '50's.  We are a site that was originally constructed for the development of prototype nuclear reactors.  The intention is we will de-commission the site so that the land will be available for any purpose, unrestricted by its previous life as a nuclear site. 

Obviously we had heard about these reviews and prior to that we had our own internal processes to ensure that the projects were in a correct state to actually move ahead.  You are always a little bit sceptical about a new process being brought in, and would it add value.  But our experience has been that it has added value.  Over a period of time the world changes, funding constraints may change, the actual method and idea that you are going to use to do the actual de-commission work may change, so I think it is useful to look at in the round again, to actually have another sort of holistic look at the whole program to say are we still on the right track.

Andy Staples, Site Closure Project Manager - UKAEA Winrith
I think it is important to get an independent view on projects because you can get too close to projects, you can tend to focus down on what you are doing without sort of taking that stand back and look overall - are you meeting what every Stakeholder wants? What are their legitimate aspirations? Gateway does that.  It does it in a formal and rigorous way.

Alan
Sometimes we may get a view from the Stakeholders that they think we want to hear, whereas having a totally independent view and a totally independent group of people asking the questions ensures that we get a very honest answer from these key Stakeholders.

Download the transcript (PDF, 10KB)