The Nuclear Installations (Prescribed Sites and Transport) Regulations 2018

Sites prescribed for the purposes of section 16(1)(a) of the Act (low risk nuclear sites)

3.—(1) There is prescribed for the purposes of section 16(1)(a) of the Act any licensed site—

(a) which is used for one or both of the purposes set out in paragraphs (2) and (4), but not for any other purpose which would require a nuclear site licence by virtue of section 1(1) of the Act; and

(b) where the mass of any fissile material present on site at any time, other than material comprised in associated nuclear fuel, does not exceed the limit specified in the appropriate entry in the table in Schedule 1.

(2) The purpose in this paragraph is installing or operating an installation designed or adapted for storage of radioactive material, other than fuel elements or irradiated nuclear fuel, which has been produced or irradiated in the course of the production or use of nuclear fuel, where the radioactive material stored at any time meets the condition in paragraph (3).

(3) The condition in this paragraph is that the quantity of any radionuclide listed or described in Schedule 2 which is present in the radioactive material does not exceed the limit specified for that radionuclide in that Schedule.

(4) The purpose in this paragraph is installing or operating a small nuclear reactor where the radioactive material present outside the reactor at any time, other than associated nuclear fuel, meets the condition in paragraph (5).

(5) The condition in this paragraph is that the quantity of any radionuclide listed or described in Schedule 2 which is present in the radioactive material does not exceed half the limit specified for that radionuclide in that Schedule.

(6) For the purpose of paragraphs (3) and (5), a limit specified in Schedule 2 is exceeded if—

(a) where the radioactive material contains only one radionuclide, the quantity of that radionuclide exceeds the limit specified in the appropriate entry in the table in Part 1 of that Schedule, or in the case of paragraph (5), half that limit; or

(b) where the radioactive material contains more than one radionuclide, the quantity ratio calculated in accordance with Part 2 of that Schedule exceeds one.

(7) In this regulation—

“associated nuclear fuel” means a quantity of nuclear fuel intended and ready for use or in use or which has been used in a nuclear reactor and which is held in, or on the same site as, that nuclear reactor which does not exceed the quantity of nuclear fuel specified in the nuclear site licence relating to that nuclear reactor or any consent or approval granted under that site licence;

“fissile material” means plutonium 239, plutonium 241, uranium 233, uranium 235 (where the mass of the isotope uranium 235 exceeds 1% of the total mass of all the uranium isotopes present), or any material containing any of them;

“small nuclear reactor” means a thermal neutron nuclear reactor designed to operate at a thermal power output not exceeding 600 kilowatts.