UK’s nuclear waste burial problems – geology and public acceptance

Criteria for site selection include relatively flat rock where groundwater moves slowly in simple formations which avoids complex, potentially leaky faultlines.

UK limits nuclear waste disposal options MENAFN – Arab News – 08/10/2012 Britain risks eroding support for nuclear power if it buries long-term waste near an existing processing facility without considering wider, potentially safer options.

UK authorities are edging toward one region for long-term waste storage where planners have rejected sites twice partly on doubts over geological security and safety. The US illustrated the risks of fixating on one area, after spending almost 15 billion assessing and
developing Nevada’s Yucca Mountain only for US President Barack Obama to shelve the plan two years ago and appoint a commission to review the issue, in that case following local opposition.
The political attractiveness of the site in West Cumbria in northwest England, by contrast, partly rests on assumed local familiarity and support given its proximity to Sellafield, where much of the country’s nuclear waste is already held above ground.

By focusing on public support, however, Britain may be drawn into protracted analysis of one site which ultimately is found to be geologically unsuitable for deep underground storage of nuclear waste, and a late exit from a massive engineering project whose discounted present cost is expected to be at least 3.7 billion pounds ( 5.98billion).

West Cumbria authorities in Britain recently delayed a formal decision
to participate in preliminary investigations.

But their approval seems likely in January because the main delay was
for assurance that they could change their minds at any stage before
construction, which should be forthcoming given that right of
withdrawal already exists.

Finland, France and Britain are among the few developed countries
still planning new nuclear power plants in the wake of the Fukushima
disaster and expect to start disposing of long-term waste underground
from 2020, 2025 and 2040.

Finland and France have now selected their repository sites, a useful
step which closes a credibility gap in nuclear power by clarifying
where the waste will end up and the taxpayer bill.

As the laggard, Britain should prioritize making the right choice, and
try to avoid a third costly, time-consuming planning rejection.
Britain commissioned its first reactor in 1956 and has since made
several investigations into the best site for long-term storage, which
involves constructing an underground grid of tunnels and depositing
the waste which is then sealed.

Criteria for site selection include relatively flat rock where groundwater moves slowly in simple formations which avoids complex, potentially leaky faultlines. In one of the most comprehensive site
selection studies, in 1988, “The Way Forward: a discussion document,”
the nuclear industry summarized site selection priorities based on an
earlier geological study in 1986.

It concluded the Sellafield site in Cumbria was “worth scrutiny.”
However, the geological survey on which it was partly based,
“Geological environments for deep disposal of intermediate level
wastes in the UK,” published two years earlier, had compiled a map of
suitable locations which all but excluded Cumbria.

That 1986 study described the east of England as the least complex and
most predictable region geologically. ….
http://www.menafn.com/menafn/1093566951/UK-limits-nuclear-waste-disposal-options

October 9, 2012 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | UK, wastes