Executive summary
Date(s) of inspection
- May 2026
Aim of inspection
To judge the adequacy of Dounreay's’ ability to implement its arrangements made under Licence Condition (LC) 11 via an on-site Level 1 exercise demonstration of its emergency arrangements.
Subject(s) of inspection
- LC11 - Emergency arrangements - Rating: Green
Key findings, inspector's opinions and reasons for judgement made
The Office for Nuclear Regulation (ONR) has undertaken an inspection to assess nuclear restoration services Dounreay's implementation of its LC11 emergency arrangements.
The intervention was undertaken and rated against ONRs expectations as described in published guidance; specifically considering the Technical Inspections Guides (TIGs) NS-INSP-GD-011 and ONR-INSP-GD-064.
Based on the evidence sampled at the time of the intervention against Dounreay's LC 11 arrangements and ONR’s guidance, I consider that NRS Dounreay did not adequately demonstrate its emergency arrangements across all of the areas sampled on the Dounreay site. I was satisfied that the exercise scenario was realistic and sufficiently challenging.
An amber rating is therefore considered appropriate, in accordance with ONR Guide ONR-INSP-GD-064.
Conclusion
ONR inspectors made observations at the site incident control centre (SICC), Forward Command Post (FCP) and Intervention Areas (containment intervention, casualty recovery) during the exercise. The observations from ONR were fed back to NRS Dounreay as part of the "hot wash-up" meeting along with the judgement. This judgement concluded that, based on the observations on the day, the demonstration did not adequately demonstrate the site's emergency arrangements particularly with respect to an effective emergency control centre to manage all activities on site to minimise release and restore the site to a safe condition. I have therefore requested the Licensee consider their approach in order to provide ONR a partial redemonstration of an effective emergency control centre and I have raised a regulatory issue at level 4 to track this action to a conclusion. It should be noted that the elements we did observe we consider adequate and believe that the Licensee would cope on the day in the event of real emergency, therefore further action is not considered proportionate at this point.