The construction of a deep geologic repository for spent nuclear fuel and other highly radioactive waste (HLW) from the UK’s nuclear reactors is likely to start in the 2040s, an official at UK state-owned Nuclear Waste Services (NWS) said at an industry webinar on 23 February.

John Corderoy, the technical director of NWS, the company owned by the UK government’s Nuclear Decommissioning Authority and which will build, own and operate the planned geologic disposal facility (GDF), said that the planned facility would be “operational and disposing waste in the early 2050s”.

Corderoy added that the “key principle” of the proposed disposal facility “was to put waste away permanently and making it passively safe.

“We know how to dispose of HLW successfully. It is question of finding a right site to host the GDF.”