It is useful to remind everyone of one political
reality. Any nation that wishes to be a nuclear weapons state must have both
nuclear reactors and a reprocessing plant such as Sellafield. The anti-nuclear
movement in the UK and abroad is convinced this strategic factor has helped
bankroll the nuclear industry for 40 years.
Update Sept 2008: Now the UK's underground nuclear dump for the waste arisings
is likely to be located in the Lake District.THE timetable for a future underground
nuclear waste dump has been made public.
And the first steps to a huge £12 billion 'Son of Nirex' starts in 2009
when a 'shadow disposal facility site licence company' is to be created. So
far Cumbria is the only part of the UK to "express an interest" in
hosting such a facility.
County councillors and officers have been informed by the NDA, of the following
timeframe for the UK's nuclear dump: Identify two candidate sites by 2012, investigate
the sites between 2014 and 2025; announce the preferred site by 2025. Stuart
Kemp, nuclear issues manager for the county council told councillors this week
that "Areas outside of Cumbria can still 'express and interest in the MRWS
process but at the time of writing there is no sign of interest elsewhere."
Reprocessing has become a 'spin
word' that puts an improved gloss on the problem of the waste
that emerges from nuclear reactors. This 'spent' fuel is a lethal
rod of uranium, plutonium and dozens of radioactive isotopes.
The act of reprocessing does not destroy any of this cocktail
of radiation. It divides and spreads the radiation into several
routes: plutonium, uranium, highly radioactive waste, medium level
nuclear waste and a lot of low level nuclear waste. In addition
the process itself increases the volume of nuclear waste by 'contaminating'
buildings, people and the environment. The financial cost of dealing
with the legacy of the nuclear industry keeps growing. In 2002
BNFL's annual report showed total nuclear liabilities on BNFL
sites (undiscounted) to be £40.5b, up from the previous
year's figure of £34.8b. All of which is being left to the
taxpayer to deal with.
The official reason for approving
the newest Sellafield reprocessing plant, called Thorp were up
front contracts to take Japanese nuclear waste and the fact that
uranium could be recycled and used to make new nuclear fuel. However
the price of raw uranium has plunged from $45 per lb. in 1978
to $10 a lb. now (August 1999). Independent UK government body
RAWMAC says: "There is no compelling waste management reasons
to reprocess oxide fuel ...at all." However reprocessing
is the economic lifeblood for the West Cumbrian communities around
Sellafield employing as it does 7,000 people. There is an apparently
acceptable alternative to nuclear reprocessing in dry storage
of the untouched spent nuclear fuel. This is the route being taken
by the USA and Scottish Nuclear(now part of British Energy) wanted
to spend £100m each on such dry storage vaults at Torness
and Hunterston B. GEC Alstrom was involved in MVDS (dry vaults)
for Colorado.
Thorp was built at a cost of
£2.7 billion. It started operating in 1994. Basic details
of the project include: 35 M. frame design building to withtstand
seismic and a 1 in 10,000 years wind; 40M stainless steel roof
span; 4200 tonnes carbon steel and 600 tonnes stainless steel.
THORP first receipt of fuel 8/8/88.Cost estimate £1.8billion,
plus £0.9 billion on support storage ponds etc. Struc Engineers
winning the award were Allott and Lomax/ Architects were BNFL.
inlet pond stainless steel lined concrete.
THORP is BNFL's largest investment. There were 5,000 contractors
on site during its construction. Permanent jobs at THORP are supposed
to be 1,400. Cost £2.7Billion. 1800 miles of cable, 200
miles pipes.
Contracts held for first decade's
work (1994-2004)of 7,000tonnes. For its second decade 58% of its
capacity is said to be agreed (from nine countries) and 43% for
the third decade. In 2003 BNFL admitted it was to pull out of
reprocessing after failure to win Thorp business left company
technically insolvent. A massive government bail out created a
successor to BNFL in the form of NDA. To quote from anti-nuclear
group CORE in 2003: "Now in its tenth year of operation and
plagued by a range of problems since it opened THORP has reprocessed
little over 4000 of the 7000 tonne Baseload and is currently running
at least three years behind schedule. At the current rate THORP
might complete the Baseload and the smaller volume post-Baseload
business from British Energy and Germany by around 2010. Fighting
off opposition claims in the early 1990’s that the plant
was a white elephant that would bankrupt BNFL, the company’s
then Chief Executive Neville Chamberlain said that "THORP
is already certain to be a successful project that will underpin
BNFL’s profitabity over the next quarter of a century"
CORE’s spokesperson said;
" It is ironic that at the same time as this so-called flagship
plant continues to flounder, BNFL has been declared bankrupt.
In their haste to get the plant open in the early 1990’s,
they deliberately ignored the increasing worldwide trend against
reprocessing and the dwindling prospects for new contracts.
THORP throughput continues to
be specifically limited by the Nuclear Installations Inspectorate
to around 50% of design throughput. This follows BNFL’s inability
to get its waste vitrification process working to a level where
the liquid High Level Wastes from THORP can be treated. Designed
to reprocess over 1000 tonnes per year, THORP was limited to just
500 tonnes last year. In 2005 THORP is expected to be handed over
to the Nuclear Decommissioning Agency (NDA) along with BNFL’s
other liabilities. Uncertainties about both the German and British
Energy post-Baseload orders may lead the NDA to consider stopping
reprocessing at THORP even earlier than 2010.''
One of the problems of opting for reprocessing, rather than spent fuel storage,
is the creation of a great deal of contaminated material. From rubber gloves
to overalls and parts of plant and machinery. This waste is classified as low
level nuclear waste and is buried at the Drigg nuclear dump two miles south
of Sellafield.(Pictured below) Ironically the security fence surrounding
this waste dump is immediately adjoining a nature reserve. Pictured are the
nuclear waste trenches that were used until the 1980's. Now the low level waste
is compressed and packaged inside steel containers before burial.
New Vitrification plant (VIT) to turn lethal
liquid high level waste into glass blocks. VIT 1 official open Michael Heseltine
March 1991, feedstock activity 1.7 x10 to power 10 bq per mil. or 460 curies
a litre. 4 watts per litre. non-active feeds sugar and glass! melter at 1050
degree c. form 25 kilos an hour. each stainless steel drum holds 150 litres.
typical surface temp in store 200 degree c. activity each 300000 curies. store
has four vaults..200 tubes per vault expected full by year 2010. cooling air
outlet temp 120 degreec. Radioactive discharges expected; aerial 6 s pwr year
alpha and 3000 MBq per year beta.
Typical of the goodwill spending by BNFL in West Cumbria include: West Cumbria
Development Fund £6.3M, Whitehaven Development Company £0.5M, Westlakes
Science Park £1.5M, others £1.3M.
In 2004 government confirmed that in 2005, it will set up the NDA to look after
UK nuclear waste at Sellafield. the authority will create between 150 and 200
civil service jobs plus more in decommissioning. Government assigned £48
billion for the task. By 2009 the estimated clean-up bill for nuclear power
in the UK had reached £72 billion.
Farewell to the cooling towers at Calderhall in 2007
