The Committee on Radioactive Waste Management

Interim storage

• Our work on interim storage covers storage, treatment and transport of higher activity wastes
• We include the management of spent nuclear fuels, plutonium and uranium which are not considered to be wastes at present but may be in the future.
• In 2010 we are focusing our scrutiny and advice on the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority’s (NDA) development of its “topic strategies” for higher activity wastes, spent fuels, plutonium and uranium.

Geological disposal

• We are scrutinising and advising on the volunteering and partnership approach to finding a site for a geological disposal facility.
• We attend the West Cumbria MRWS Partnership as observers
• We scrutinise the work of NDA’s Radioactive Waste Management Directorate (RWMD), the Government’s delivery organisation for geological disposal.
• In particular, we look at its implementation planning and development of a disposal system safety case.
• We will scrutinise the British Geological Survey’s work to identify areas in West Cumbria that are not suitable for a geological disposal facility.

Scottish Government policy

Scotland has decided not to adopt geological disposal and has developed its own policy.

• We have scrutinised the development of the Scottish policy and supporting documents (doc. 2795).
• We have responded to the consultation on the policy.
• We will publish the results of our scrutiny of the whole policy development process early in 2011, after the policy document has been finalised by the Scottish Government.

Research and development

• We are awaiting the Government response to our 2009 report on Research and Development (R&D) (doc 2543) and expect to have discussions with Government about how to address our recommendations.
• We are continuing to scrutinise R&D by NDA and others on topics relevant to interim storage
• We are scrutinising RWMD R&D on geological disposal.

Engagement

• We scrutinise the public and stakeholder engagement (PSE) activities of the various organisations involved in the management of higher activity wastes.
• We carry out our own PSE: meeting various groups of people, sending out documents for comment and maintaining this website.
• We will be producing a review of other organisations' PSE in early 2011.