Shipments of radioactive material from Dounreay to Sellafield will be terminated within the year, a new outline of a 20-year business plan has revealed.
The movement of highly enriched uranium and plutonium from the Caithness site was originally supposed to take 60 trips beginning in 2014 and ending in 2020.
However, according to an updated business plan, the rail shipments could be over as soon as 2018/19 t5o Sellafield in Cumbria.
A spokeswoman for Dounreay said: “We started to return nuclear fuel in 2001 and we expect this programme to take until the 2020s to complete.
“Our priority at all times is to comply with regulations governing the safety and security of nuclear material, both while in store and during transport. Compliance includes protecting detailed information about the schedule for transports.”
The nuclear material is from UK nuclear programmes from the last 40 years.
Despite containing uranium and plutonium the material is considered safe to recycle.
