The 'Hot' nature created by Sellafield
Since the 1950's Sellafield has pumped a quarter of
a tonne of plutonium and a cocktail of other radioactive isotopes
out of twin sea discharge pipes into the Irish Sea. Because the
radioactive pollution is detectable the pollution can be traced
as it flows into the seas around Britain. In April 1997 the Bedford
Institute of Oceanography, Nova Scotia found Sellafield radiation
had reached the Arctic.
In 1990 a government funded project used helicopters
to survey radiation "hot spots" in the area. The map
(above) shows the radiation levels are highest (red and brown)
around the estuary of the Rivers Esk and Mite and around Sellafield
itself. In March 2001 the University of Glasgow REACTORS team
at East Kilbride will complete a further helicopter monitoring
survey for the DETR.
State-owned British Nuclear Fuels (BNFL) has invested
heavily in technology such as its EARP and SIXEP (Site Ion Exchange
Plant) to remove as much of the pollution as possible. They have
cut discharges of radioactivity by 100 fold since the mid 1970's.
But the legacy from earlier, less careful days, mean that silts
and sediments are laced with low level contamination.
This contamination enters Irish Sea fish and shellfish. The UK
Government's RAWMAC 11th annual report in 1990 warned "there
is still some concern about the fate of the larger quantities
of radioactivity discharged in the past. "
"The plutonium and americium (decays into plutonium) in
the discharges have been found not to disperse but to concentrate
in the fine cohesive sediments of the Irish Sea.''
In 1976 an un-noticed leak from a waste silo led to 50,000 curies
of radiation seeping out. Media attention was at it peak in 1983
when radioactive ruthenium was allowed out to sea and washed
back onto the holiday beaches. The public were told to stay away
from the contaminated beaches and BNFL was stung by a £70,000
court bill for the leak. It was this same beach that in 1992
was the target for a public attack by the rock band U2 with the
group's singer Bono teaming up with Greenpeace to protest at
the radioactive waste being dumped out to sea. Greenpeace at
one stage sent hired divers down to the undersea section of the
Sellafield discharge pipelines and succeeded in inserting inflatable
bungs which brought reprocessing briefly to a halt. The most
recent instances of the effects of the pollution have been that
in 1997 technetium (a dangerous radioactive isotope) were found
to be exceeding EEC safe intervention level in lobsters.
And a bizarre example of how radioactive contamination can just
spread through the eco-system came in 1998 when 700 feral pigeons
that used a nearby garden as a roost were found to be so contaminated
BNFL had to take away part of the garden's top soil it was so
polluted. The pigeons had been roosting in semi-derelict parts
of the vast Sellafield site. They had then been flying three
miles to nearby Seascale village to be fed by animal lovers.
The UK Ministry of Agriculture then issued warnings that the
public should not consume local pigeon meat.
Over the last 20 years BNFL has reduced Sellafield discharge
levels to less than 1% of their peak levels. In the past 10-15
years the company has invested more than £2billion in waste
management and effluent treatment facilities.
But the legacy will never end..as a June 2003 report adds..RADIOACTIVITY in the ground water under Sellafield is spreading into the sandstone rocks under the area.
The subject was raised by former BNFL manager Allan Whittaker as a member of the public at the Sellafield Local Liaison meeting at Whitehaven civic hall on Friday.
The Environment Agency spokesman Andrew Ferguson confirmed at the meeting that it has been aware of the radioactivity getting into groundwater for some time.
They told the meeting: "Latest results indicated that contamination of groundwater is slightly more wide spread laterally, than previously thought. In addition both tritium and technetium99 have been detected in the sandtsone aquifer, which underlies Sellafield."
Recommended reading is Inside Sellafield by an insider who should know...former BNFL Director Harold Bolter (Published by Quartet-ISBN 0 7043 8017 X)
To find out more about Sellafield, the following web sites
may be helpful.
