A contract worth between £12 million and £15 million has been awarded for the restoration of the Dounreay nuclear site in Scotland.

Cavendish Nuclear has been chosen to develop the Design and Engineering Services Framework for Dounreay Site Restoration Limited (DSRL) for up to four years.

It includes a range of services to support projects such as design, engineering validation, environmental restoration, construction management, software modelling and waste strategy documentation.

The experimental dome-shaped Dounreay Fast Reactor (DFR) had a capacity of 14MW and could generate enough electricity to power around 9,000 homes.

Most of the core fuel was removed following its closure in 1977 but the remaining material will be removed, packaged and transported to Sellafield for long term storage and processing.