This book illustrates the important role played by the nation’s railways in Britain’s nuclear power industry and describes how the need to secure that service through the turbulent period of privatisation led to the creation of one of the country’s most dynamic railway companies, Direct Rail Services.
The Railways and Britain's Nuclear Industry sets the scene with a brief history of nuclear power in Britain and the technology behind it, not just the reactors but the plants that processed the uranium, built the fuel elements and reprocessed the spent fuel. It goes on to illustrate the transport of the spent nuclear fuel from across Britain to the Sellafield Reprocessing Plant in West Cumbria.
In the 21st century the decommissioning of the first generation of reactors and a swathe of other Ministry of Defence establishments across the south of England added to the waste already travelling by rail to the national Low Level Waste Repository, also in West Cumbria. The railways also transported chemicals for the nuclear industry, construction materials and – at least in part - the industry's workers too.
Direct Rail Services took over all this traffic and then added to it by becoming a major player in the rail freight business and latterly assuming a significant role in the nation’s passenger market.
The Railways and Britain's Nuclear Industry illustrates this transformation and explains why it happened. The ten descriptive chapters are interspersed with many colour illustratons, mainly presented in two-per page format. 96 pages.