Friday 12 December 2025

We’re all familiar with our washing machines at home and at the laundrette, but did you know UKNNL has one that washes out uranium? 

Spearheaded by senior waste residue chemist Tahera Docrat, principal scientist Howard Greenwood, and the pilot plant team at our Preston laboratory, this unique capability demonstrates exactly how we are enabling the nation’s nuclear ambitions – in this case, by recycling valuable materials and taking the ‘nuclear’ out of the remaining waste. 

From incinerator to innovation 
The story begins in the 1980s, when an incinerator was built at Springfields in Preston to deal with HEPA filters that had collected uranium dust from plant ventilation. However burning the filters as originally intended proved unsuitable.  

UKNNL came up with an ingenious solution: why not wash the filters instead of burning them and then dispose of them like you would at home? 

We modified an industrial washing machine to enable removal of uranium from the filters. The process is surprisingly similar to doing laundry at home. Instead of detergent, nitric acid is fed in to dissolve the uranium dust. The filters then go through three water washes, followed by a spin cycle. 

The results speak for themselves. Initially, UKNNL processed two tonnes of filters, washing them down from Intermediate Level Waste to Low Level Waste so they could go to landfill as normal. Critically, the uranium extracted from the filters was reprocessed back into fuel that has powered homes across the country – a perfect example of UKNNL’s capability to recycle wherever possible and make remaining waste safe for normal disposal, a process which continues to this day. 

As Tahera likes to say: “We make the liability disappear.” 

A unique capability 
The washing machine patent lasted 20 years, and the process has been so successful it’s been modified to clean soft plastics like bags, hard plastics like hoses and pipework, and even contaminated clothing. 

The success led Springfields Fuels Ltd to introduce a washing machine facility with over 10 machines that have processed thousands of ventilation filters and similar material. UKNNL conducts test work to advise on washing processes for all forms of waste. However, anything higher than 5% enriched uranium can only be processed by UKNNL, making this a unique capability of ours.  

Over the years, dozens more tonnes of material have gone through UKNNL’s washing machines and Springfields remains the only nuclear site that cleans filters in this way. 

This innovative approach exemplifies how UKNNL is strengthening the nuclear enterprise today – managing and optimising the current reactor fleet by finding practical solutions to waste challenges, recycling valuable nuclear materials, and reducing the environmental footprint of nuclear operations.