U.S.
Mark Lombard, director of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s Division of Spent Fuel Management, has been promoted to deputy director of the agency’s Office of Administration.
Michael Layton, director of the Division of Security Operations in the Office of Nuclear Security and Incident Response, will replace Lombard, who has spent five years in the position.
The NRC has not officially announced the promotion, nor set start dates, but Lombard confirmed the move last week at an industry event.
The NRC website already lists Lombard in his new role at the office that provides administrative services in a wide range of areas including transportation, food services, labor services, supplies, graphics, and printing.
Lombard is a mechanical engineer who joined the regulator in 2003. He has held a number of roles, including director of the NRC Division of Facilities and Security and associate director for space planning and consolidation.
Layton, a geologist, has served in his current role since February 2015.
INTERNATIONAL
Sellafield Ltd. has agreed to a collaborative agreement with the National Nuclear Laboratory (NNL) for the £70 billion ($86.7 billion) decommissioning of the United Kingdom’s Sellafield site, the companies announced Wednesday.
The two partners will focus on reducing hazards at the U.K.’s most complex nuclear waste site through technical research and development. The 55-building decommissioning project is expected to take 100 years.
Past examples of collaboration between Sellafield and NNL include the development of industrial robots for the site’s waste stores and research on management of intermediate-level waste. NNL serves as an independent consultant for the U.K. and international nuclear industry, with a focus on reducing the cost of cleanup and decommissioning.
Sellafield Ltd. Chairman Tony Fountain signed the agreement with NNL Chairman Andrew Mathews. The two sides, according to the announcement, have conducted research for managing intermediate-level waste, which Sellafield says will reduce the site’s cleanup cost by hundreds of millions of pounds.
“To be successful the futures of Sellafield Ltd and NNL are inextricably linked,” Sellafield Ltd. Technical Director Rebecca Weston said in a statement. “The history, knowledge and experience shared by the respective technical teams reinforce these links. It is therefore important to recognise this in the formal relationship between the organisations.”
NNL Managing Director Paul Howarth said in his statement: “Sellafield Ltd has always accounted for the largest portion of our work, and around half of our workforce – and our biggest nuclear laboratories – are based on the Sellafield site. Within NNL we have a good deal of science, technology and innovation which can help to reduce the cost and timescales of the clean-up mission whilst improving safety. I am confident that we will see even more success ahead for both organisations – and for the UK’s nuclear sector as a whole – over the coming years.”
