‘This contract is great news for Sellafield,’ said Gareth Frazer, head of manufacturing and engineering solutions at Sellafield Ltd, as a Cumbrian collaboration secured a four‑year deal worth up to £10m to make nuclear waste containers in the county.

A government announcement confirms the Cumbria Manufacturing Alliance - featuring Carlisle’s Bendalls Engineering and West Cumberland Engineering in Workington, alongside other partners - has landed two contracts to supply 3m³ legacy boxes that will help speed up waste retrievals at the Sellafield site.

The initial scope will deliver the first 60 box assemblies to support the Box Encapsulation Plant’s active commissioning phase. Fabricated from stainless steel and designed for remote handling, the boxes will transfer intermediate‑level waste from legacy ponds into the Box Encapsulation Plant.

Before production scales up, engineers will complete the design for manufacture and lock in build processes. The first six box assemblies are planned for delivery by Autumn 2026, with further batches scheduled through the four‑year term.

Frazer described the work as a key enabler for retrievals and a skills boost for the county, creating opportunities to ‘upskill and develop people’ and build regional supply chain ‘capability and capacity’. For teams in Carlisle and Workington, it keeps high‑value fabrication in Cumbria.

Early boxes will be put straight to work: testing plant performance and pre‑loading the facility with empty containers so commissioning runs smoothly, ahead of operations starting in 2027, according to Sellafield Ltd.

Once the plant is operational, Sellafield expects it to process ‘much higher rates of retrievals’ from the site’s ‘legacy silos and ponds’, reducing the risk profile of some of its most hazardous facilities. That carries obvious safety benefits for West Cumbria communities living alongside the industry.

Beyond the headline value, the project strengthens local capability in nuclear‑grade fabrication and quality assurance, showing that complex, safety‑critical kit can be bought and built in the North rather than brought in from elsewhere. It also gives the alliance a strong reference point for future decommissioning work.

Next steps are clear: complete the design for manufacture, then move into box production and delivery, beginning with six assemblies by Autumn 2026. Government case studies set out how the Box Encapsulation Plant and its Product Store will operate ahead of full operations in 2027.