The unique strategic partnership, supporting research with a potential value of up to £900,000, will see the NDA work with researchers from the University of Aberdeen in areas of mutual interest to the nuclear, oil and gas sectors.
Research areas will include decarbonization of decommissioning activities, economic impacts, cost benchmarking, and remote operations in hazardous environments.
This agreement builds on three years of discussions involving the NDA, the NDC, the Net Zero Technology Centre, regulators, including the North Sea Transition Authority, and industry bodies, which sought to identify mutually beneficial opportunities through information and lessons learned from each sector.
The partnership will build on ongoing research at the NDC and the University of Aberdeen to deliver a research agenda that will benefit the nuclear and offshore energy sectors.
It will include links to a project supported by the Scottish Government’s Energy Transition Fund in which the NDC is working with the offshore energy sector to reduce emissions from decommissioning operations by introducing alternative processes, new technologies and assessing opportunities for broader collaboration.
The partnership also aims to harness the capabilities of the NDC’s £1.6m simulation suite, to enable operational scenarios related to nuclear decommissioning activity to be tested in a safe virtual environment.
This will allow users to reduce risk when doing things like removing or moving infrastructure, or deploying new technologies to understand which ones are best suited for a task.
Welcoming the agreement, Karl Sanderson, Head of Interprofessional Learning at NDA, said:
“The civil nuclear industry has engaged with other industry sectors in many areas of common interest in recent years, sharing lessons learned on more than 15 topics, involving more than 150 organizations.
“This new relationship with the NDC will build on previous collaboration to enable joint projects and research, which aim to establish the UK as an emerging center of global excellence in decommissioning.”
A cross-industry workshop between NDA and NDC to leverage learning between the nuclear decommissioning and oil and gas sectors.
Professor Richard Neilson, Director of the NDC at the University of Aberdeen, said:
“We are excited to partner with the NDA to explore areas where our expertise can add value in nuclear and offshore decommissioning contexts, including remote operations, decarbonization, benchmarking costs and potentially underwater laser cutting.
“We look forward to working closely with our colleagues at the NDA as we seek solutions that help address the many challenges of nuclear decommissioning, while delivering cross-industry benefits.”
Roger Esson, Head of Industry and Partner Networks, Net Zero Technology Centre, added:
“At the Net Zero Technology Center we know the value of partnership and collaboration, our strategic partnership with the University of Aberdeen to fund the NDC, continues to provide opportunities to share knowledge to address the challenges facing our industry. faces as we seek to achieve our net zero ambitions.
“This latest agreement brings two research partners together to address their challenges and establish where common ground and mutual interests could benefit all parties – it is this kind of cross-sector learning that will accelerate the energy transition.”