Chemistry against COVID: Ellie Laney-Bolton
Ellie Laney-Bolton MChem CChem Picture: Supplied
Ellie Laney-Bolton of Cheltenham is a Chartered Chemist with a very important job, supporting continued operation of the country鈥檚 nuclear power stations that are helping keep our lights on.
In her role with EDF, Ellie ensures the boilers, which are crucial for maintaining safety and for generating power at the nation鈥檚 nuclear power plants, remain in perfect condition by carefully managing the environment to prevent corrosion and maximise efficiency. With nuclear power providing a steady flow of energy for the nation, she is very much a chemist who plays a crucial part in keeping the nation鈥檚 lights on.
When the lockdown was announced, Ellie鈥檚 team quickly moved to reduce staff numbers in the central office and the chemistry teams at each of the power stations started to operate with two or three different shift teams.
The majority of Ellie鈥檚 team are now supporting the power stations remotely. Crucially, with all data transmitted digitally, this has no impact on the team鈥檚 ability to gather information from the site.
Ellie said: 鈥淎s a company, EDF were somewhat prepared for a pandemic with a response plan put in place following the SARS outbreak in 2002. I don鈥檛 think anybody thought we鈥檇 ever put it into practice, but EDF are always ready to respond to the unexpected.
鈥淲e have learned that we are very resilient and have discovered extra efficiencies we may not have found had this not happened. EDF is very much a learning organisation and I鈥檓 sure we will implement what we鈥檝e discovered in our future operations.鈥�
Ellie has been with EDF providing low carbon electricity for more than seven years after joining on a graduate scheme after gaining a Master鈥檚 Degree in Chemistry from the University of Liverpool. She says she thinks many people will be surprised by the number of jobs chemists do in operating power stations up and down the country.
鈥淚 don鈥檛 think many people are aware of what it takes to keep a power station running and the variety of roles required. We are very focussed on maintaining a constant and reliable supply of electricity 鈥� EDF is currently supplying around a quarter of the UK鈥檚 electricity, with the majority of this coming from our nuclear power stations. Nuclear power is a low carbon electricity source, so keeping these stations running minimises the use of coal and gas stations which emit high levels of CO2.
鈥淢y job and the job of everyone I work with is to first and foremost ensure our power stations are run safely. Second priority is to make sure they keep running, which is particularly important at the moment when we need good availability of key utilities.
鈥淔or me, my primary role is to make sure the boilers of our power stations are operated in an environment which does not increase the risk of corrosion and therefore ensure their safe operation. This is achieved by using very pure water and maintaining an elevated pH, which are both monitored by my chemistry colleagues at each of the power stations.
鈥淒uring the pandemic, this evidently remains a priority, but we are running with fewer staff on site and there is a risk that supply of key chemicals used to maintain the correct environment could be impacted. To support the stations, my colleagues and I have been working to understand where it is safe to reduce chemical monitoring and dose levels, whilst ensuring operation of all chemistry related systems is not adversely affected. This work will help to reduce the workload of our colleagues at each of the power stations in these challenging times.鈥�