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For further details about this year's event, please visit the event website.
Please could you briefly explain your role, involvement, and experience with regards to Nuclear Ventilation and the IMechE’s 11th Nuclear Ventilation Conference?
Bernard Swinnerton (BS): I work in the Engineering directorate for the Sellafield site where I supply design and engineering support for the nuclear ventilation and building services discipline. I am the current Chair of the National Nuclear Ventilation Forum, which is attended by members of UK nuclear site licence companies, nuclear ventilation practitioners within the supply chain and representatives from ventilation plant manufacturers. I will be attending the IMechE’s 11th Nuclear Ventilation Conference as a co-chair for the event.
What, in your experience, has been the biggest roadblock for utilising innovative technologies in your sector?
BS: The nuclear sector has traditionally relied heavily on tried and tested robust engineering solutions that have been substantiated to provide reliable and high integrity plant capable of operating well beyond the design life of commercial off the shelf plant items. Innovative technologies can sometimes lack the operational data, gathered over many years, to adequately substantiate their use in a nuclear facility; and cannot always provide evidence, initially, of having the high integrity and robustness required to operate reliably in nuclear plants.
What key topics are you excited to discuss at this year's conference?
BS: I am looking forward to hearing about the work carried out by Mississippi State University Institute for Clean Energy Technology on their findings from the evaluation of aging effects on HEPA filters and their media.
What would you say are the technologies or applications to watch for the future?
BS: We need to reduce the amount of energy consumption on our ventilation systems in nuclear facilities, so the methods of heat recovery and the integrated heat pump technology, within Air Handling Units, presented at this year’s conference will be of high interest.
Who else are you most interested in hearing from on the programme?
BS: The presentations by the manufacturers which will cover the manufacturing processes of key nuclear ventilation plant items such as high integrity ductwork and fans, HEPA filters and filter housings.
Why is it important for engineers to join this conference?
BS: During the pandemic, the industry missed out on the kind of collaboration and connectivity that is best served by face to face dialogue. After the 2021 IMechE Nuclear Ventilation Conference was held virtually, the 2023 Conference will be a welcome opportunity to re-establish the environment
where we can freely share knowledge across the UK and Internationally, and help establish relevant good practice in the Nuclear Ventilation discipline. At a time when there appears to be an Industry wide shortage of Engineers to meet the anticipated future demand, this conference, particularly with the focus on presentations from the supply chain, offers a unique learning opportunity for less experienced Engineers, and equally, consolidation of learning for those more experienced.
The Nuclear Ventilation 2023 conference will take place on 14-15 November 2023 in Manchester.
Taking place every two years and now in its 11th successive iteration, this two-day conference is the only event of its kind that enables power industry professionals and engineering practitioners from all sectors of the nuclear community to stay abreast of developments in nuclear ventilation within the UK.
For further details about this year's event, please visit the event website.