nuclear-news

Miliband explores cut-price clean-up of Britain’s deadliest nuclear waste.

The UK’s massive nuclear waste stockpile includes 110,000 tonnes of uranium, 6,000 tonnes of spent nuclear fuels and about 120 tonnes of plutonium – mostly stored at the Sellafield nuclear site in Cumbria in decaying containers and ageing buildings.

Space equivalent to eight Royal Albert Halls is required to dispose of highly toxic substances.

Ed Miliband is backing a cut-price clean-up of
the UK’s growing nuclear waste mountain. The Energy Secretary’s plans
involve highly radioactive used fuel rods being dropped into holes drilled
deep into the Earth’s crust.

The experimental approach, pioneered by Deep
Isolation, an American company, is being funded by the Department for
Energy Security and Net Zero (Desnz), which is helping develop the
toughened canisters needed to contain the deadly waste. If it works, the
method could offer a faster and cheaper way of dealing with the hundreds of
tonnes of high-level radioactive waste accumulated by the UK over the last
seven decades and the new waste generated by future reactors like Hinkley
Point C, under construction in Somerset.

The solution will see used fuel
rods from nuclear reactors placed into steel cylinders designed to fit into
boreholes drilled thousands of feet into deep rock formations. The UK’s
massive nuclear waste stockpile includes 110,000 tonnes of uranium, 6,000
tonnes of spent nuclear fuels and about 120 tonnes of plutonium – mostly
stored at the Sellafield nuclear site in Cumbria in decaying containers and
ageing buildings. UK Government Investments warned in its annual report
that the cost of “nuclear decommissioning threatens the Government’s
finances due to its inherent uncertainty.” The Office for Budget
Responsibility has issued similar warnings. A key problem for the UK is
that, despite decades of trying, it still has no way of permanently storing
nuclear waste. The current plan is to excavate a network of caverns under
the sea, filling them with nuclear waste and then sealing them with cement.
However, work is not expected to start till at least 2050 and will take
decades to complete. Deep boreholes could offer a faster and cheaper
solution for at least some of the waste. Under the Deep Isolation scheme,
boreholes would be drilled into rock using technology first developed by
the oil and gas industry for “fracking”.

 Telegraph 21st April 2025,
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2025/04/21/miliband-cut-price-clean-up-deadliest-nuclear-waste/

April 25, 2025 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | UK, wastes