[en] The decommissioning of nuclear power plants and fuel cycle centers in the United Kingdom has become an emotive subject and has, along with waste management, been blamed for the apparent demise of the nuclear power industry. During the early eighties, in the United Kingdom, it was becoming obvious that some of the older defence facilities could not be left in their existing condition for much longer. A program was drawn up and discussions held with the responsible authorities. At about the same time, consideration was also being given to the dismantling of the nuclear facilities that were or had been used as part of the programme of nuclear fuel cycle services to the civil nuclear programme in United Kingdom. As a consequence of these activities, a comprehensive decommissioning policy and programme for the defence related and fuel cycle centers had been drawn up. In addition to this, the Atomic Energy Authority began planning a decommissioning programme on the Windscale Advanced Gas Cooled Reactor after its shut down in 1981. 4 refs

[en] Storage of nuclear fuel after it has been discharged from reactors has become the leading spent fuel management option. Many storage facilities are being required to operate longer than originally anticipated. Aging is a term that has emerged to focus attention on the consequences of extended operation on systems, structures, and components that comprise the storage facilities. The key to mitigation of age-related degradation in storage facilities is to implement effective strategies to understand and manage aging of the facility materials. A systematic approach to preclude serious effects of age-related degradation is addressed in this paper, directed principally to smaller facilities (test and research reactors). The first need is to assess the materials that comprise the facility and the environments that they are subject to. Access to historical data on facility design, fabrication, and operation can facilitate assessment of expected materials performance. Methods to assess the current condition of facility materials are summarized in the paper. Each facility needs an aging management plan to define the scope of the management program, involving identification of the materials that need specific actions to manage age-related degradation. For each material identified, one or more aging management programs are developed and become part of the plan Several national and international organizations have invested in development of comprehensive and systematic approaches to aging management. A method developed by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission is recommended as a concise template to organize measures to effectively manage age-related degradation of storage facility materials, including the scope of inspection, surveillance, and maintenance that is needed to assure successful operation of the facility over its required life. Important to effective aging management is a staff that is alert for evidence of materials degradation and committed to carry out the aging management programs

[en] The Static Database Access library was first introduced in EPICS (Experimental Physics and Industrial Control System) Release 3.11 in 1994. It provides an application program interface (API) for database configuration tools written in C to manipulate database record definitions and is used for various tasks within the core EPICS software. This paper describes the structure of a replacement for the original library that adds a native C++ API and will make some future enhancements to EPICS significantly easier to implement

[en] Activities of BNFL in all stages of the nuclear fuel cycle starting from uranium ore concentrate are described

[en] BNFL is in a unique position in that it has commercial experience of diffusion enrichment, and of centrifuge enrichment through its associate company Urenco. In addition BNFL is developing laser enrichment techniques as part of a UK development programme in this area. The paper describes the development programme which led to the introduction of competitive centrifuge enrichment technology by Urenco and discusses the areas where improvements have and will continue to be made in the centrifuge process. It also describes the laser development programme currently being undertaken in the UK. The paper concludes by discussing the relative merits of the various methods of uranium enrichment, with particular reference to the enrichment market likely to obtain over the rest of the century. (author)

[en] The Sizewell-B reactor control and instrumentation integrated systems for central operation includes three computer systems networks each based on a different computer technology. The strategy for the implementation of closed-loop control at Sizewell-B and the principles of allocation of control functions to the different computer control systems is discussed. Station Automatic control loops are important to safety and have a direct effect on the station output. Probabalistic safety assessment target reliabilities have been derived making it essential to implement the Automatic control systems within the environment of the High Integrity control system. (Author)

[en] This paper discusses the reactor refurbishment program at Bruce Power. The project includes re tubing, refurbishment of steam generators, turbine generators, key plant inspections, nuclear safety and licensing

[en] Central to the control and instrumentation system of the Sizewell B nuclear power plant is a control, data acquisition and control system based on a distributed network of several hundred microprocessors. The system has been integrated into a single functional unity, and software modifications affecting one part of it have an effect on the other parts. The software modification and configuration processes are therefore kept as similar as possible. (A.K.)

No abstract available

[en] A short review is given of the available experimental information as well as a discussion of some freatures of the experimental procedures. For relevant theories of nuclear rotation the reader is referred to other papers in these Proceedings. (author)