Nuclear in the UK

The nuclear sector is a cornerstone of the UK's public services. It encompasses power stations, weaponry, and facilities which produce and process nuclear fuel. It is one of the UK's most regulated industries, with strict health and safety standards that must be continually adapted during a nuclear facility’s life cycle. A core part of this adaptation is the Safety Case.

IHF has extensive experience supporting clients to meet the human factors requirements of their safety cases. Below you will find some of the services we provide.

nuclear workers

Our services

nuclear safety engineer

Human Factors Substantiation

The integration of human factors is a key part of all nuclear facilities' safety cases and a requirement of the Office for Nuclear Regulation (ONR). It's a requirement that, despite extensive documentation, leaves some ambiguity and may cause issues during a compliance inspection.

We have years of experience in supporting facilities to ensure there's proportionate substantiation of operational claims. Typically services include a walkthrough of safety significant tasks, assessment of the feasibility and validity of operational claims, report writing and liaison with the ONR.

nuclear power plant worker

Human Reliability Analysis

Human factors principles should be integrated across the engineering lifecycle. We can help do this with requirements capture, assessment and validation. We will perform both quantitative and qualitative human reliability analysis, including the use of THERP and JHEDI.

We have broad experience in stakeholder management and know exactly how to engage and train staff in human factors principles.

nuclear plant control panel

Design Review

In a high-risk environment, any interface which requires human interaction should be intuitive. Job conditions should nurture worker performance, and system design should make it easy to follow instructions and difficult not to - this is where human-centred design comes in.

IHF can assess any equipment, process or procedure that involves human interaction and identify the risks, before providing recommendations on how to improve.

About us

IHF is one of the UK’s leading Nuclear Safety consultancies. Our experts are chartered Ergonomists and Human Factors Specialists with over 20 years’ experience working across high hazard industries predominantly in the Nuclear and Defence sectors.

We have a philosophy of ‘Right First Time’ safety and understand exactly what operational standards are required from a human factors standpoint.

 

Get in touch today


One of our human factors associates will be on hand to learn about your business and see if we can help.