Programme Manager - Site Development & Deployment

About newcleo

Privately funded and headquartered in London, newcleo was launched in 2021 – and since raised a total of EUR 400m – to be an innovator in the field of nuclear energy. Its mission is to generate safe, clean, economic and practically inexhaustible energy for the world, through a radically innovative combination of existing, accessible technologies.

With visionary co-founders, newcleo capitalises on thirty years of R&D activity in metal-cooled fast reactors and liquid-lead cooling systems, and our senior management and advisory team can boast hundreds of years in cumulative hands-on experience.

newcleo’s technology, mostly comprising a novel approach to already qualified solutions, addresses equally well the three challenges affecting the nuclear industry to date: waste, safety and cost.

• Waste: fast reactors are capable of efficient use of depleted uranium, plutonium and Minor Actinides. When operated with MOX fuel generated from reprocessed nuclear waste, newcleo’s reactors not only ensure sustainability by closing the fuel cycle, but can also boost energy independence.
• Safety: lead-cooled reactors operate at atmospheric pressure. The properties of lead (thermal capacity and conductivity, boiling point, chemically inert, low neutron activation, shielding properties) together with newcleo’s passive safety systems ensure very high levels of safety.
• Cost: newcleo’s reactor design has been optimised over the last 20 years leading to the concept of an ultra-compact and transportable 200MWe module with improvements in energy density compared to other technologies. Costs are kept low by means of simplicity, compactness, modularity, atmospheric pressure operation and elevated output temperature.

newcleo is also working to significantly invest in MOX fuel manufacturing in developed countries, extracting energy from the current nuclear industry by-products.

newcleo is ready to develop a new, sustainable, and completely safe way of generating nuclear energy that will help humanity reach zero emissions, and mitigate of global warming.

Overview of the role:

newcleo is driving forwards an exciting and challenging international programme to develop and deploy our innovative Lead-cooled Fast Reactor technology.  We are looking for an experienced, highly motivated and pro-active Programme Manager to support the development programme to deploy the LFR200 Reactors on UK sites, and other potentially other countries.

This central role has responsibility for providing the development leadership, programme management and integration across UK projects (Siting, Site Characterisation, Site specific design, Consents, Permits, Licensing etc.) and our Global Engineering team to enable deployment of our LFR reactor technology. You will work closely with the newcleo project development and project engineering teams to coordinate and oversee the full programme lifecycle from initial feasibility and concept design through to commercial operations, acting as Intelligent Customer in close collaboration with the Design Authority.

In the early stages, you will help to build the integrated plan for deployment, shape the site specific design working closely with our expert designers and engineers across the Global Engineering function, ensure an integrated approach to site development, consenting and permissioning; and develop and manage the overall set of programme requirements.

You will work closely with newcleo colleagues and key stakeholders to ensure all project specific requirements are agreed and delivered to guarantee the design is safe, affordable, consentable but also meets all UK regulatory requirements.  With multiple projects running in parallel to the LFR-200 development, you will be the point of contact to ensure consistent delivery and information management for technical delivery.

Main duties/role and responsibilities:

Project/Programme Development

• Programme manage the integration of newcleo’s UK nuclear new build projects, facilitating the development and deployment of LFR 200 nuclear power plants on UK sites, in line with newcleo’s responsibilities as a prospective nuclear site license holder and intelligent customer duties and working in close collaboration with colleagues across newcleo both in the UK and overseas.
• Ownership of the overall integrated plan for the engineering, procurement, construction and commissioning of the UK projects, ensuring interfaces and key milestones are clearly identified and defined, work is broken down into unique work packages and resources are clearly identified.
• Develop and maintain the Programme Execution Plan for LFR200 deployment and lead the development of any Business Cases required to support key funding approvals for site deployment.
• Manage, influence, record and report progress of design and engineering work required for site development and deployment, ensuring that regulatory requirements and expectations are met, contractual duties and obligations are fulfilled including any specified technical and consenting requirements.
• Lead the identification of the overall technical, project delivery and commercial requirements for site development and deployment. Ensure these requirements are feed into Global Engineering so the LFR200 design is able to respond to the UK context.
• Lead the development of the programme work breakdown structure, breaking the development and deployment work down into appropriate project and/or work package specifications to be procured/ carried out by others (e.g. other newcleo entities, local contractors/ suppliers), working closely with the Design Authority and broader newcleo team.
• Ensure engineering and broad project development issues are identified and progressively resolved, acting as an integrator/focal point to ensure the relevant inputs are delivered in a timely manner.
• Lead the transition of projects from engineering / design phase into procurement, construction, commissioning and handover to operations, ensuring appropriate information flows and handovers are in place risks/ opportunities are well managed, and issues are coordinated and resolved promptly.
• Support the development and agreement of budgets for projects and/or programmes and identify critical milestones and interfaces between projects. Work with PMs / Project Leads to ensure these are well defined and tracked. In particular ensure the monitoring of interdependencies and milestones from the other programmes (LFR30, Engineering, Fuel, R&D etc.).

Project/Programme Delivery

• Manage general communications, technical queries, early warnings, and actions to support timely progress of the programme.
• Manage key programme risks, assumptions, issues, dependencies, and their mitigation approaches.
• Conduct proactive health checks and reviews, support project teams with implementing findings and recommendations. Escalate and address non-conformance issues proportionately to their impact and needs of the business.
• Support in drawing conclusions from the monthly reporting data, collaborating with project managers to provide analysis and recommendations on areas of focus and proactive interventions and ensure that the consistent and accurate management information gets to key governance meetings in a timely manner.
• Develop close working relationship with newcleo colleagues in France to ensure there is transfer of knowledge, lessons learned, best practice with the site development and consenting activities for the French LFR200 Fleet development.

Interface Management

• Establish and maintain a strong interface with the GDA team, SSE Case team, Licensing team, Consents and Permits team, Site Acquisition and Characterisation team, and “back-office” teams (e.g. Finance, IT, PMO, Procurement, etc) to enable LFR-AS-200 deployment.
• Establish and maintain a strong interface with the LFR-AS-30 design team, the R&D team, and the Fuel Cycle team to ensure design decisions, risks, R&D results, and other outcomes from these programmes are communicated and understood by the LFR-AS-200 programme.

Programme/Project Management

• Apply best practices in programme management and planning in line with newcleo processes and procedures, and ensure deliverables are provided to time, cost, quality and without compromise to achieving safety, security and environmental outcomes balanced effectively with a commercially viable project that can help meet UK environmental and security goals for energy.
• Help develop, establish and maintain and governance for project delivery for the LFR 200 Deployment Programme, defining clear roles, responsibilities and accountability that align with overall programme governance practices. Ensure a clear RACI across projects and programmes between Project Controls, PMs and Project Participants.

Team Leadership

• Develop, lead and manage a small agile high performing team of professionals delivering Programme and Project Management services for site development and LFR200 deployment.
• Build and maintain PM capability and capacity to match current and future needs, this will include defining the operating model for project managemnent for the LFR200 Programme through its full lifecycle to commercial operations.
• Be responsible for staff development, including identifying training and development needs, and ensuring capability development plans are in place for each member of the project controls team with clear performance parameters set for each role and measured accordingly via career performance appraisals.

Procurement and Supply Chain Management

• Work closely with project and commercial managers to ensure robust contract and supply chain management from the outset balance delivery, value for money and commercial risks.

Information and Document Management

• Ensure information management and document control processes and systems are correctly followed.

Knowledge Management and Continuous Improvement

• Support with lessons learnt and knowledge capture to support drive continuous improvement in schedule development and management across newcleo.
• Actively contribute to the development and execution of Programme and Project Management good practice corporately, including taking an active role in the newcleo PMO Community of Practice.

Attributes/Experience Required:

Experience

• Significant major programme and infrastructure industry experience across sectors such as nuclear/energy, oil and gas, process and petro-chem industries, with experience of working on complex multi £m (£250m +) projects/programmes within a highly regulated environment.
• Experience of the front end development of major infrastructure programmes/projects including exposure to permitting, consenting and licensing processes in the UK.
• Clear track record of leading the early project development phases for complex large scale projects/programmes from programme definition through to delivery.
• Demonstrable experience in a team leader level role.
• International experience would be beneficial, especially Europe.
• Exposure to business case development and infrastructure project funding processes and mechanisms would be beneficial.

Expertise and Knowledge

• Excellent knowledge of programme and project management .
• Strong technical/engineering background.
• Excellent knowledge UK HSE standards and regulations, in particular CDM.
• Good understanding of UK consenting and permitting processes and standards.
• The ability to influence the engineering design, consenting/permitting strategies and construction methodologies to support the optimium delivery schedule.

Qualifications

• Combination of academic qualification and appropriate professional experience in project management, construction and/or engineering fields.
• Professional affiliation (e.g. APM, RICS, ICE etc) desirable.
• Evidence of continuous professional development and career progression.

Personal Attributes

• Great leadership, communication (both written and verbal) and interpersonal skills including influencing with experience of leading teams and contracts on major complex programmes.
• Ability to create credibility with internal stakeholders, able to build confidence and influence effectively at all levels.
• Ability to operate in teams across multiple locations.
• Results focused with the ability to meet commitments and deadlines.
• Attention to detail but with an ability to assure reports produced by others and provide meaningful, actionable insights as well as being able to simplify data for presentation to a wide range of audiences.
• Able to advise on complex requirements and communicate analysis and corrective measures effectively.
• The ability to engage, motivate and coach others enabling the creation of high performing teams.
• Ability to act as a role model and inspire and empower others.
• Fluent written and spoken English.
• Language skills in French or Italian would be beneficial, but not essential.

Security

• The role will require the individual to achieve a national security clearance equivalent to a BPSS standard, or higher, within a reasonable period.

Residential Status and Location

• Right to work in the UK.

• This role can be based in our Manchester or Gloucester offices, with a minimum of 3 days a week attendance in the office.