The Nuclear Decommissioning Authority

Representatives from 12 UK organisations attended an Environmental Assessments workshop organised by NDA's Radioactive Waste Management Directorate (RWMD) at the end of July 2012. 

The aim of the workshop was to formally introduce statutory consultees to the Managing Radioactive Waste Safely (MRWS) environmental assessment processes and in particular the work planned for Stage 4. It also outlined the drivers behind environmental assessment. 

Statutory consultees are organisations and bodies, who by law must be consulted on relevant planning applications. 

The Managing Radioactive Waste Safely site selection process is led by Government and is based on voluntarism and partnership with potential host communities. It is a staged process and Stage 4 will start once a community has taken a "Decision to Participate". This stage would see a Community Siting Partnership established with the local community, Government, NDA and others. The candidate site selection process would include carrying out environmental assessments for potential sites in which a geological disposal facility could be built.  

At this stage no community has taken a decision to participate in MRWS Stage 4 and the workshop was organised as part of the early planning process.

RWMD's Head of Stakeholder Engagement and Communications, Elizabeth Atherton, said: "The event provided us with an opportunity to meet some key stakeholders who will play an important long-term role in the Managing Radioactive Waste Safely process and for them to outline how they would like us to engage with them in the future." 

The principal outcomes of the workshop were: 

• A shared understanding of the need for good planning when working with stakeholders to identify the most efficient forms of engagement;    
• The importance of engagement with 'wider' stakeholder groups going beyond statutory requirements; 
• A shared appreciation that engagement preferences and needs will vary according to each organisation's differing objectives and policies; and 
• Agreement that the mechanisms for engagement will be wide ranging and will depend on the messages being communicated, the inputs required, the audience and the timescales. 

Elizabeth added:

"The workshop was a successful start to engagement with this important group. Engagement processes for MRWS Stage 4 are still in the early stages of development and this event gave us the opportunity for early discussions and helped us to establish and develop relationships." 

"Preliminary feedback has been very positive and suggests that the workshop was effective in showing our ongoing commitment to operate an open and transparent process," she said. 

A report of the workshop will be produced and published on the NDA website.  Further follow up meetings with interested organisations will be organised in the near future.