Great British Nuclear (GBN), the UK body set up to oversee the plans for new nuclear, is launching a tender to procure up to two owner’s engineers (OEs) as part of its small modular reactor SMR programme. The tender notice is expected to be published on 2 June.
Earlier in April three of the four competition finalists in GBN’s SMR competition submitted their final tenders. Earlier in April Rolls-Royce SMR and GE Hitachi (GEH) submitted their final tenders. The remaining finalist is Westinghouse Electric. The four finalists had received an invitation to Submit Final Tender (ISFT) in February.
GEH (part of GE Vernova) proposed its BWRX-300 boiling water reactor; Holtec proposed its SMR-300 – a 300 MWe pressurised water reactor (PWR); the Rolls-Royce SMR is a 470 MWe PWR; and the Westinghouse AP300 is a 300 MWe/900 MWt PWR. GBN said then that it planned to select up to three of the technologies, with the intention of supporting their deployment.
According to the Prior Information Notice, on the Gov.UK “Find a tender” site, the selected contractors will support the deployment of the “first-of-a-kind” nuclear technology within the UK. This move will advance GBN’s objective of securing a Final Investment Decision for up to two SMR projects.
It added: “In particular, the OE will act as a ‘client friend’ to the Intelligent Customer and Intelligent Client and provide competent resource to undertake specification, oversight, audit, review and advice for decisions relating to design, scope, budget, risk, delivery and contract compliance. It will also play the role of subject matter expert to deliver independent technical and delivery Line of Defence 2 assurance on major design and build contracts.”
GBN said the total value of the contract is £600m ($799m), assuming two contracts are awarded (one for each planned SMR project), each with a total contract value of up to £300m, although the actual value “will depend on a number of factors”. Submissions will be accepted until 19 September and a decision on the contract winner(s) is expected to be made on 12 March 2026. The duration of the OE contract is not yet confirmed. However, the notice envisages a 14-year term, “but please note that GBN will set a completion date once the outcome of the SMR Technology Partner procurement is known”.
From the start of the contract, any prospective OE will need to commit to providing a list of 36 technical and six programme capabilities.
The technical capabilities include: Core Design Authority, Safety Case, BAT (Best Available Techniques) Case, Chemistry, Civil Engineering, Commissioning, Control & Instrumentation, Construction, Conventional Waste, Criticality, Cyber Security, Decommissioning, Electrical Engineering, 14. Environmental Protection, Engineering Management, Equipment Qualification, Emergency Planning & Response, External Hazards, Fault Studies, Fuel & Core Design, Human Factors, Internal Hazards, Leadership and Management for Safety, Supply Chain and Quality, . Mechanical Engineering, Protective Security, Probabilistic Safety Analysis, Radiological Protection, Radioactive Waste Management, Reactor Core Physics, Requirements Management, Safeguards, Safety Case Analysis and Techniques, Severe Accident Analysis, 34. Structural Integrity, System Engineering and Training.
Programme capabilities include: Planning and Scheduling, Cost Estimating and Cost Management, Risk Management, Scope Management, Change Management, and New Engineering Contracts.
While GBN considers this list of technical and programme capabilities to be comprehensive, “it reserves the right to change them (and any other information provided in this notice) by the time of launching the OE procurement”.
GBN said there will be two stages in the OE procurement process. In the first stage, tenderers will need to respond to the Procurement Specific Questionnaire (PSQ), which will include conditions of participation. If the response submitted by a tenderer satisfies all the relevant conditions, the tenderer will be invited to submit a tender as part of the second stage of the procurement. GBN will then assess the proposals against questions covering technical, commercial and social value criteria. However, GBN “reserves the right to refine its award criteria during the procurement process”.
