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Geological disposal facility for nuclear waste could cost £54bn and ‘appears unachievable’.

15 Aug, 2025 By Tom Pashby

The UK government’s proposed solution for long-term storage of high-level waste from the nuclear sector, a geological disposal facility (GDF), has been described as “unachievable” in a Treasury assessment of the project.

 The National Infrastructure and Service
Transformation Authority (Nista), a Treasury unit, made the assessment in
its Nista Annual Report 2024-2025, published on 11 August, where it rated
213 other major infrastructure projects.

A GDF represents a monumental
undertaking, consisting of an engineered vault placed between 200m and 1km
underground, covering an area of approximately 1km2 on the surface. This
facility is designed to safely contain nuclear waste while allowing it to
decay over thousands of years, thereby reducing its radioactivity and
associated hazards. NWS declares that this method offers the most secure
solution for managing the UK’s nuclear waste, aimed at relieving future
generations of the burden of storage.

The project would be so vast that it
would require two separate development consent order (DCO) applications to
be approved – one for exploratory works and another for the project
itself. Nuclear Free Local Authorities secretary Richard Outram said:
“The Nista Red rating is hardly surprising. The GDF process is fraught
with uncertainties and the GDF ‘solution’ remains unproven and costly.
“A single facility as estimated by government sources could cost the
taxpayer between £20bn and £54bn, this being a nuclear project it is much
more likely to be the latter and beyond.”

 New Civil Engineer 15th Aug 2025, https://www.newcivilengineer.com/latest/geological-disposal-facility-for-nuclear-waste-could-cost-54bn-and-appears-unachievable-15-08-2025/

August 16, 2025 Posted by | UK, wastes | Leave a comment

The lethal legacy of Aukus nuclear submarines will remain for millennia – and there’s no plan to deal with it.

Ben Doherty, 10 Aug 25, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/aug/10/the-lethal-legacy-of-aukus-nuclear-submarines-will-remain-for-millennia-and-theres-no-plan-to-deal-with-it

“None of the leaders who announced Aukus are in power any more,” he tells the Guardian. “One hundred thousand years from now, who knows what the world looks like, but Australia, whatever is here then, will still be dealing with the consequences of that high-level waste.”

Australia’s future nuclear submarines will produce highly radioactive waste, and allies in the UK and the US still don’t have a safe place to store their own.

In the cold deep waters of Rosyth Harbour lie the dormant hulks of Britain’s decommissioned nuclear submarines.

One of the shells lashed to the dock here is HMS Dreadnought, Britain’s first nuclear-powered submarine. It was commissioned in 1963, retired in 1980, and has spent decades longer tied to a harbour than it ever did in service. The spent nuclear fuel removed from its reactor remains in temporary storage.

For decades the UK has sought a solution to the nuclear waste its fleet of submarines generates. After decades of fruitless search there are “ongoing discussions” but still no place for radioactive waste to be permanently stored.

Similarly, in the US – the naval superpower which controls a vast landmass and which has run nuclear submarines since the 1950s – there is still no permanent storage for its submarines’ nuclear waste.

More than a hundred decommissioned radioactive reactors sit in an open-air pit in Washington state, on a former plutonium production site the state’s government describes as “one of the most contaminated nuclear sites in the world”.

This is what becomes of nuclear-powered submarines at the end of their comparatively short life.

A nuclear-powered submarine can expect a working life of three decades: the spent fuel of a submarine powered by highly enriched uranium can remain dangerously radioactive for millennia. Finland is building an underground waste repository to be sealed for 100,000 years.

For Australia’s proposed nuclear-powered submarine fleet there is, at present, nowhere for that radioactive spent fuel to go. As a non-nuclear country – and a party to the non-proliferation treaty – Australia has no history of, and no capacity for, managing high-level nuclear waste.

But Australia is not alone: there is no operational site anywhere on Earth for the permanent storage of high-level nuclear waste.

‘Australia shall be responsible … ’

Documents released under freedom of information laws show that, beginning in the 2050s, each of Australia’s decommissioned Aukus submarines will generate both intermediate- and high-level radioactive waste: a reactor compartment and components “roughly the size of a four-wheel drive”; and spent nuclear fuel “roughly the size of a small hatchback”.

The Australian Submarine Agency says the exact amount of high-level waste Australia will be responsible for is “classified”.

Because Australia’s submarines will run on highly enriched uranium (as opposed to low enriched uranium – which can power a submarine but cannot be used in a warhead) the waste left behind is not only toxic for millennia, it is a significant proliferation risk: highly enriched uranium can be used to make weapons.

The eight nuclear-powered submarines proposed for Australia’s navy will require roughly four tonnes of highly enriched uranium to fuel their sealed reactor units: enough for about 160 nuclear warheads on some estimates.

The spent fuel will require military-grade security to safeguard it.

The problems raised by Australia’s critics of Aukus are legion: the agreement’s $368bn cost; the lopsided nature of the pact in favour of the US; sclerotic rates of shipbuilding in the US and the UK, raising concerns that Australia’s nuclear submarines might never arrive; the loss of Australian sovereignty over those boats if they do arrive; the potential obsolescence of submarine warfare; and whether Aukus could make Australia a target in an Indo-Pacific conflict.

All are grave concerns for a middle power whose security is now more tightly bound by Aukus to an increasingly unreliable “great and powerful friend”.

But the most intractable concern is what will happen to the nuclear waste.

It is a problem that will outlive the concept of Australia as a nation-state, that will extend millennia beyond the comprehension of anybody reading these words, that will still be a problem when Australia no longer exists.

And it cannot be exported.

The Aukus agreement expressly states that dealing with the submarines’ nuclear waste is solely Australia’s responsibility.

“Australia shall be responsible for the management, disposition, storage, and disposal of any spent nuclear fuel and radioactive waste … including radioactive waste generated through submarine operations, maintenance, decommissioning, and disposal,” Article IV, subclause D of the treaty states.

As well, should anything go wrong, at any point, with Australia’s nuclear submarines, the risk is all on Australia.

Australia shall indemnify … the United States and the United Kingdom against any liability, loss, costs, damage or injury … resulting from Nuclear Risks connected with the design, manufacture, assembly, transfer, or utilization of any Material or Equipment, including Naval Nuclear Propulsion Plants,” subclause E states.

“‘Nuclear Risks’,” the treaty states, “means those risks attributable to the radioactive, toxic, explosive, or other hazardous properties of material.”

‘Decide and defend’

An emeritus professor at Griffith University’s school of environment and science, Ian Lowe, tells Guardian Australia that the government’s regime for storing low-level nuclear waste is a “shambles”. He says the government’s “decide and defend” model for choosing a permanent waste storage site has consistently failed.

“You currently have radioactive waste from Lucas Heights, from Fishermans Bend, and from nuclear medicine and research all around Australia, just stored in cupboards and filing cabinets and temporary sheds,” Lowe says.

“The commonwealth government has made three attempts to establish a national facility – it’s a repository if you’re in favour of it, it’s a waste dump if you’re opposed – and on every occasion there’s been local opposition, particularly opposition from Indigenous landowners, and on each of those three occasions … the proposal has collapsed.”

Most of Australia’s low-level and intermediate nuclear waste – much of it short-lived medical waste – is stored at the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation facility in Lucas Heights in outer Sydney. Lowe says the nuclear safety regulator, ARPANSA, does a commendable job in protecting the public but the facility was never intended to be permanent.

Australia has been searching for a permanent site for nuclear waste for nearly three decades.

Its approach – derided by Lowe as “decide and defend”: where government chooses a place to put radioactive waste and then defends the decision against community opposition – has failed in Woomera, in central South Australia, in the late 1990s, then Muckaty station in the Northern Territory, then on farmland near Kimba, again in SA.

The federal court ruled against the Kimba plan in 2023, after a challenge from the traditional owners, the Barngarla people, who had been excluded from consultation.

Lowe, the author of Long Half-Life: The Nuclear Industry in Australia, says the complexities and risks of storing high-level nuclear waste from a submarine are factors greater than the low- and intermediate-level waste Australia now manages.

“The waste from nuclear submarines is much nastier and much more intractable,” he says. “And because they use weapons-grade highly enriched uranium there is the greater security issue of needing to make sure that not only do you need to protect against that waste irradiating people and the environment, you must also ensure that malevolent actors, who have in mind a malicious use of highly enriched uranium, can’t get their hands on it.”

Australia’s decision to use highly enriched uranium to power its submarines, as opposed to low enriched uranium (reactors would need refuelling each decade), is a “classic case of kicking the can down the road and creating a problem for future generations”, Lowe argues.

“In the short term, it’s better to have highly enriched uranium and a sealed reactor that you never need to maintain during the life of the submarine. But at the end of the life of the submarine, you have a much more serious problem.”

The high-level nuclear waste from Australia’s submarines will be hazardous for “hundreds of thousands of years,” Lowe says.

“There are arguments about whether it’s 300,000 or 500,000 or 700,000 years, but we’re talking a period at least as long as humans have existed as an identifiably separate species. The time horizon for political decision makers is typically four or five years: the time horizon of what we’re talking about is four or five hundred thousand years, so there’s an obvious disconnect.”

Inside ‘Trench 94’

The US and the UK have run nuclear-powered (and nuclear-armed) submarines for decades.

In the UK, 23 nuclear submarines have been decommissioned, none have been dismantled, 10 remained nuclear-fuelled. Most are sitting in water in docks in Scotland and on England’s south-west coast.

The first submarine to be disposed of – the cold war-era HMS Swiftsure was retired from service in 1992 – will be finally dismantled in 2026. Keeping decommissioned nuclear subs afloat and secure costs the UK upwards of £30m a year.

There is still no site for permanent storage of their radioactive waste: there has been “progress and ongoing discussions”, the defence minister, Lord Coaker, told the House of Lords last year, but still no site.

The UK has about 700,000 cubic metres of toxic waste, roughly the volume of 6,000 doubledecker buses. Much of it is stored at Sellafield in Cumbria, a site described by the Office for Nuclear Regulation says as “one of the most complex and hazardous nuclear sites in the world”.

In the US, contaminated reactors from more than 100 retired submarines are stored in “Trench 94” – a massive open pit at the Hanford nuclear site in Washington state. Spent nuclear fuel is also sent to the Idaho National Laboratory and sites in South Carolina and Colorado. Hanford is designed to last 300 years but the site has a chequered history of pollution and radiation leaks. Washington state describes it as “one of the most contaminated nuclear sites in the world”.

Finland is the first country to devise a permanent solution. It is building an underground facility 450 metres below ground, buried in the bedrock of the island of Olkiluoto.

The Onkalo – Finnish for cave or cavity – facility has taken more than 40 years to build (the site was chosen by government in 1983) and has cost €1bn. It is now undergoing trials.

‘A Trojan horse’

In March 2023 Australia’s defence minister, Richard Marles, said high-level nuclear waste would be stored on “defence land, current or future”, raising the prospect that a site could be identified and then declared “defence land”. A process for establishing a site would be publicly revealed “within 12 months”, he said. That process has not been announced nor a site identified.

Australia will require a site for high-level nuclear waste from the “early 2050s”, according to the Australian Submarine Agency. Senate estimates heard last year that there have been no costings committed for the storage of spent fuel. And preparing a site for storing high-level radioactive waste for millennia will take decades.

Guardian Australia sent a series of questions to Marles’ office about the delayed process for selecting a site. A spokesperson for the Australian Submarine Agency responded, saying: “The government is committed to the highest levels of nuclear stewardship, including the safe and secure disposal of waste.

“As the Government has said, the disposal of high-level radioactive waste won’t be required until the 2050s, when Australia’s first nuclear-powered submarine is expected to be decommissioned.”

The spokesperson confirmed that Australia would be responsible for all of the spent nuclear fuel and radioactive waste generated from the Aukus submarines: it would not have responsibility for intermediate- or high-level radioactive waste – including spent fuel – from the US, UK or any other country. No permanent storage site had been identified for low-level radioactive waste, which would include waste from foreign submarines.

The government has consistently said it will engage extensively with industry, nuclear experts and affected communities to build a social licence for a permanent storage site.

But Dave Sweeney of the Australian Conservation Foundation says he has seen little evidence of genuine effort to build social licence.

The leaders who signed the Aukus deal – and those who continue to support it – have failed to comprehend the consequences beyond their political careers, he says.

“None of the leaders who announced Aukus are in power any more,” he tells the Guardian. “One hundred thousand years from now, who knows what the world looks like, but Australia, whatever is here then, will still be dealing with the consequences of that high-level waste.”

Sweeney says the “opacity” of the decision-making around the Aukus agreement itself is compounded by fears that the deal could be only the beginning of a nuclear industry expansion in Australia.

“We see this as a Trojan horse to expanding, facilitating, empowering the nuclear industry, emboldening the nuclear industry everywhere,” he says. “It is creepy, controversial, costly, contaminating, and leading to vastly decreased security and options for regional and global peace.”

Beyond the astronomical cost of the submarine deal, its the true burden would be borne by innumerable future generations.

“We are talking thousands and thousands of years: it is an invisible pervasive pollutant and contaminant and the only thing that gets rid of it is time. And with the whole Aukus deal, that’s what we’re running out of.”

August 11, 2025 Posted by | AUSTRALIA, wastes | Leave a comment

Tepco wraps up latest round of treated water release in Fukushima

 Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings said Sunday that it has completed
the second round of its fiscal 2025 release of treated water into the ocean
from the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant.

The discharge of the water, containing radioactive tritium, was suspended due to a tsunami caused by a major earthquake near Russia’s Kamchatka Peninsula last week, but there
were no problems with the facilities involved in the operation. In the
second round, which began on July 14, Tepco diluted 7,800 tons of treated
water with large amounts of seawater before releasing it about 1 kilometer
off the coast of Fukushima Prefecture through an undersea tunnel. In the
current fiscal year through next March, a total of 54,600 tons will be
released into the sea in seven rounds, at the same pace as the previous
year.

 Japan Times 3rd Aug 2025, https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2025/08/03/japan/tepco-2nd-round-treated-water-release/

August 7, 2025 Posted by | Fukushima continuing, wastes | Leave a comment

The Enduring Problem of Nuclear Reactor Waste

It is estimated that over the course of nuclear energy’s development in the ensuing decades, the industry produced 250,000 tons of highly toxic nuclear waste across fourteen countries worldwide without authoritatively developing a strategy for its safe storage.

July 30, 2025, By: Brian C. Black, https://nationalinterest.org/blog/energy-world/the-enduring-problem-of-nuclear-reactor-waste

The problem of nuclear reactor waste will have to be resolved as nuclear energy becomes more frequently adopted as the world’s source of power.

No one is pro nuclear waste. Simply, nuclear waste is a problem related to one method of generating electricity. The arguments against nuclear development because of the waste it generates have only intensified as we have filled in the gaps of our knowledge and learned more about its long-term toxicity. The realities of nuclear waste, simply, make us ask the question: How much do we need this energy?

In 2025, as our drive for electricity grows with planned data centers all over the world, many observers are choosing to overlook the problems of nuclear waste in order to generate more power and—at times—diminish our reliance on fossil fuels. 

As we rush to reopen mothballed nuclear facilities such as Three Mile Island and to develop new ones, it is important to slow down and recall the simple fact of nuclear power: even with no accidents, nuclear power creates waste materials that remain toxic for thousands of years, and we still have no reasonable plan on what to do with them. We may choose to look the other way, but the wake of nuclear development is littered with toxic locales that remind us that any power obtained from nuclear reaction also creates waste that remains poisonous to humans for decades, if not longer.

A Relic of the Cold War?

or a few decades in the mid-1900s, the inertia of the Cold War and the belief in nuclear power’s potential fueled the rapid development of nuclear power. Reactors began to be used for electricity generation throughout the United States by the 1970s, only to see support erode after industrial accidents occurred, most noticeably at Three Mile Island, near Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, in 1978 and abroad at Chernobyl (then the Soviet Union, now Ukraine) in 1986. Many other reactors proceeded to generate power effectively and demonstrated that such accidents were an exception. While the industry faced challenges of public confidence and opinion over the final decades of the 20th century, nuclear power was often viewed internationally as a “clean” way of generating the power that might allow development to occur.

Clearly, though, the basic challenges inherent in the toxicity of the waste of a normal functioning reactor were never fully accounted for. Throughout the 1980s, for instance, efforts grew to create a repository in the American West where such spent fuel could be deposited and kept for the decades—even centuries—in which it was thought to remain toxic. The most protracted effort focused on Yucca Mountain in Nevada. The proposed Yucca Mountain Repository has remained mired in legal issues involving jurisdiction (it is located on the Western Shoshone Native American reservation) and the issue of a state’s right to determine its economic and environmental future. In short, no one wants nuclear waste in their backyard.

In retrospect, these challenges only amplified the issues that grew from the Cold War’s emphasis on energy centrality. Nuclear power spent decades as an important technology in supporting a drive for energy development that was seen as essential to both Soviet and American success, and little thought or planning went into the end-use challenges inherent in the technology. The competitive environment of the Cold War drove the rapid extraction of uranium, and the need to drive development pressed nuclear power forward even though it remained a technology with critical flaws.

Inevitable Waste Produced by Atomic Power

It is estimated that over the course of nuclear energy’s development in the ensuing decades, the industry produced 250,000 tons of highly toxic nuclear waste across fourteen countries worldwide without authoritatively developing a strategy for its safe storage. Most often, the highly radioactive material is collected and stored at inactive nuclear power plants. In the case of Chernobyl, some of the plant’s reactors still contain an enormous amount of waste that will remain dangerous for tens of thousands of years. Of course, in 2019, one entire reactor was encased in a concrete “sarcophagus” that will safely store the material for a century—a temporary band-aid to be dealt with more carefully later

However, a similar problem exists in nations that did not experience a reactor meltdown. Reports show that the “largest amount of untreated nuclear waste is at the Sellafield plant in the UK.” The plant has not generated electricity since 2003, but 100,000 employees are involved in ongoing nuclear decommissioning activities. These efforts at Sellafield are expected to last more than a century and will cost the government billions of dollars, even though it has produced no power for decades.

Well after the fact, many nations are now working to devise ways of storing nuclear waste permanently, even if they no longer wish to generate electricity with reactors. Finland, which generates approximately thirty-two percent of its electricity with five nuclear plants, is considered to have devised the first feasible plan for long-term storage of nuclear waste. The Onkalo spent nuclear fuel repository is a deep geological repository that is expected to begin operating next year. When completed, the Onkalo site will store 2,300 tons of high-level waste at a cost of approximately $3.4 billion.

Finland’s process required decades of negotiation and planning. Though it is considered experimental, the Onkalo site is based on the KBS-3 method of nuclear waste burial that was developed in Sweden. It will store nuclear waste for at least 100,000 years. And we can’t really know whether or not it can succeed. The generating technology failed to account for this inevitable outcome at its earliest stages of development. Now, nuclear waste is a problem that threatens many societies.

Conclusion: Ranking the Dangers of Energy Production

Over the last few decades, scientists have taught us a great deal about the dangers of climate change, which is caused by burning fossil fuels. Through their research findings, it has become accepted knowledge that the Earth would benefit from humans generating power in a different way. In sum, we have learned that all energy production comes with a cost, and, therefore, nuclear power has gotten another look at possibly powering the future.

Does this reality, then, lead us to choose between evils and decide to generate electricity through nuclear reactions? Possibly. But it is important that we scrutinize the technology as an energy production industry. Similar to other industrial enterprises, nuclear power generation creates hazardous and toxic waste. In the case of nuclear waste, though, it must be safely transported and interred. Technical answers and extensive investment will be essential.

The uniquely supportive, unquestioning culture of the Cold War is clearly a thing of the past. Examples of this rather blindly confident coordination between military and industrial interests are scattered across the American landscape. Some examples, such as the vast open spans of New Mexico or Idaho, might be expected; others, nestled in more populated areas, such as Pennsylvania, surprise contemporary Americans. Each of them, though, and the vast span of all of them together, reveals an era when our nation quietly took on a dramatic technological project and succeeded in applying it to power generation. To continue its use, though, we must now apply the new knowledge about nuclear waste that will allow its end-use products to be safely managed.

August 4, 2025 Posted by | wastes | Leave a comment

TEPCO logs net loss in April-June on Fukushima plant cleanup.

The company booked an extraordinary loss of 903 billion yen, as it prepares for the removal of nuclear fuel debris

August 1, 2025 (Mainichi Japan), https://mainichi.jp/english/articles/20250801/p2g/00m/0bu/008000c

TOKYO (Kyodo) — Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings Inc. said Thursday it posted a net loss of 857.69 billion yen ($5.8 billion) for the April-June period, pressured by a special loss related to decommissioning work at its Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.

The second largest quarterly loss since the 2011 nuclear crisis is a sharp deterioration from a profit of 79.24 billion yen in the same period a year earlier.

Operating profit rose 2.9 percent to 64.70 billion yen in the quarter on sales of 1.43 trillion yen, down 4.5 percent.

The company booked an extraordinary loss of 903 billion yen, as it prepares for the removal of nuclear fuel debris, considered the most challenging phase of the decommissioning work.

“We are not expecting any big spending over the next three years and (the special loss) won’t be a problem for our decommissioning work,” TEPCO vice president Hiroyuki Yamaguchi said at a press conference.

TEPCO said Tuesday the full-scale removal of melted fuel debris, initially set for the early 2030s, will be delayed to fiscal 2037 or later, raising concerns that its target of completing the work to scrap the power plant by 2051 will become increasingly difficult to meet.

The company said it has about 700 billion yen earmarked for future demolition work.

August 3, 2025 Posted by | business and costs, Japan, wastes | Leave a comment

Debris removal at Fukushima nuclear plant pushed back to 2037 or later

30 July 25, https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2025/07/30/japan/fukushima-nuclear-plant-debris-removal/

Full-scale removal of nuclear fuel debris from the No. 3 reactor of Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings’ crippled Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant will not start before fiscal 2037, officials said Tuesday.

The removal was previously planned to begin in the early 2030s. This delay may push the completion of the plant’s decommissioning process beyond the target year of 2051 set by the government and Tepco.

The new timeline for the work was announced by Tepco and Nuclear Damage Compensation and Decommissioning Facilitation, or NDF, at separate news conferences. They determined that preparations for the work, such as the demolition of an adjacent building, will take about 12 years to 15 years.

“We aren’t in a situation where we should deny (the feasibility of) the decommissioning target,” said Akira Ono, head of Tepco’s in-house company in charge of the decommissioning work. “We remain committed to the goal of completing (the decommissioning process by 2051.)”

A total of 880 metric tons of debris, or a mixture of melted nuclear fuel and reactor structures, is believed to be in the No. 1 to No. 3 reactors at the nuclear plant, which suffered a triple meltdown following the March 2011 massive earthquake and tsunami.

Tepco began to extract debris from the No. 2 reactor on a trial basis last year, and has collected a total of about 0.9 gram so far.

According to Tepco and the facilitation organization, debris removal will be carried out using a combination of what is known as the nonsubmerged method, in which the debris is collected from the air, and what is called the filling and solidification method, which involves pouring a filling agent into the reactor and solidifying it.

A small hole will be opened in the upper part of the reactor building to insert a device that will crush the debris into fine pieces, while a filling agent will be injected as needed. The debris will be collected using a device inserted from the side of the building.

Tepco and the organization said demolishing a waste treatment building on the north side of the No. 3 reactor is necessary to ensure work safety and create space for new equipment. They also said that necessary facilities need to be built in the upper part of the reactor building, and such preparations are expected to take about 12 years to 15 years.

August 1, 2025 Posted by | Fukushima continuing, wastes | Leave a comment

Nuclear: more than 3,000 radioactive drums discovered off the coast of Brest!

More than 3,000 radioactive drums have been discovered in the waters off Brest. Very old nuclear fuel.

Jean-Baptiste Giraud, July 17, 2025,
https://lenergeek.com/2025/07/17/nucleaire-3-000-futs-radioactifs-brest/

In the nuclear sector, the issue of radioactive waste storage is posing increasing problems. During a mission off the coast of Brest, Ifremer and the CNRS counted more than 3,000 drums deposited on the seabed. They could pose a threat to France.

Nuclear waste is accumulating at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean


The return of a scientific mission off the coast of Brest has shaken the scientific community. After a month of intensive research, a team of experts revealed they had located more than 3,000 radioactive drums submerged in the Atlantic Ocean , a discovery that inevitably raises the question: should we be worried?

Behind this large-scale mission, a specific objective: to understand the fate of nuclear waste dumped between 1946 and 1993 by several European countries . During this period, more than 200,000 drums containing radioactive waste were dumped in international waters, at depths reaching 4,700 meters in the abyssal plain of the northeast Atlantic. The NODSSUM (Nuclear Ocean Dump Site Survey Monitoring) project has mapped an area of 163 km² where these drums are concentrated, some of which are in an advanced state of degradation.

The mission, led by the CNRS and Ifremer with the support of several national and international partners, used cutting-edge technologies to study the abyss. Aboard the ship L’Atalante, scientists deployed an autonomous submarine, UlyX, equipped with a sophisticated sonar system, allowing them to probe the seabed and obtain precise images of the condition of the 3,350 barrels.

No worrying radioactivity… for now

After several weeks of research, the good news is that the mission did not observe any “anomalous radioactivity” in the areas analyzed. For the researchers, there is therefore, as of yet, no reason to panic. However, not everything is that simple. Although the radioactivity does not appear to have crossed any worrying thresholds, some drums have shown signs of advanced corrosion, suggesting that material leaks may be occurring. The mission reveals that these leaks, although still difficult to identify precisely, could be due to the presence of bitumen, a material often used to seal waste in drums.

However, this is only a hypothesis. Future sampling will be necessary to better understand the exact nature of these substances and their impact on the marine environment.
This discovery raises many questions about nuclear waste management. Why were these drums submerged at a time when radioactive waste management was not as strictly regulated? While the practice of dumping waste has been banned since 1993, the question of the environmental impact of these repositories remains open. The results of this mission, still preliminary, underline that special attention will need to be paid in the future.

The next stage of the research will be to analyze the sediment, water and marine organisms in the area to detect possible contamination . In addition, a new mission is already planned for the coming years to study the barrels more closely and take additional samples , particularly of marine fauna that could be affected by this waste.

July 21, 2025 Posted by | France, wastes | Leave a comment

Toxic radioactive legacy of rare earths processing plan.

Industrial health expert T Jayabalan told FMT that he lived in Bukit Merah for three years during the 1980s, “collecting data” on the residents there. According to him, Lai Kwan and Cheah were only two of the many people he studied before presenting his findings to Malaysian courts. “Birth defects still exist,” he said, “and the number of miscarriages is incredibly high. Even if a foetus survives, it can still be born with leukemia and brain damage.”

“I’ve seen it happen with my own eyes. I’ve seen the suffering of these people. The only good thing about Lynas is that it hasn’t happened yet.”

(includes VIDEO)  Inside the world of a radiation victim, Free Malaysia Today Patrick Lee,  November 24, 2011 VIDEO  Tan Chui Mui’s short documentary is also about a mother’s undying love. Cheah was born in 1983, a year after Lai Kwan worked as a bricklayer at the Mitsubishi rare earth plant in Bukit Merah, Perak.

Cheah has multiple congenital defects, including a hole in the heart. He is also mentally deficient and virtually blind. And Lai Kwan is beside her son nearly every hour of her life, as portrayed in a short film entitled “Lai Kwan’s Love”…..

she tells the camera that she had no idea that the rare earth plant where she worked was handling toxic materials.

“We were working at the factory’s extension site. We didn’t know what kind of factory it was. We simply worked there….

Lai Kwan said she had not received compensation for her son’s disability, and that two men attempted to pay her into keeping quiet over Cheah.

“They asked me not to say my son’s sickness is related to the rare earth plant. I said I didn’t want the money, whatever the amount was. If I take your money, I said, and your factory continues to operate here, more newborns will get sick. What good is the money then?”

The film is the second in a four-part series called “Survival Guide Untuk Kampong Radioaktif”, a project designed to show viewers the adverse effects of radiation.

The Asian Rare Earth plant in Bukit Merah was closed in 1992 following years of protests from local residents. The area is still going through a massive RM303 million clean-up by Mitsubishi Chemicals.

None of the people in Bukit Merah were compensated, although Mitsubishi Chemicals donated RM500,000 to the community’s schools in an out-of-court settlement.

Locals in the 11,000-large town have blamed the plant for the population’s many birth defects and eight leukemia cases. Seven of the leukemia cases have since died……

Birth defects still exist’

Industrial health expert T Jayabalan told FMT that he lived in Bukit Merah for three years during the 1980s, “collecting data” on the residents there.

According to him, Lai Kwan and Cheah were only two of the many people he studied before presenting his findings to Malaysian courts. “Birth defects still exist,” he said, “and the number of miscarriages is incredibly high. Even if a foetus survives, it can still be born with leukemia and brain damage.”

Jayabalan also said that many people associated with Bukit Merah had since passed away, including “lawyers and plaintiffs” involved with the case.

“They died of cancer. Some of them died very young.”

He said he worried that the controversial Lynas rare earth plant near Kuantan, which is expected to see operations begin early next year, would see a “tenfold” effect.

“The amount of metals to be used is huge compared to Bukit Merah, and it’s going to leak, and these areas (in Kuantan) are prone to flooding,” he said.

“I’ve seen it happen with my own eyes. I’ve seen the suffering of these people. The only good thing about Lynas is that it hasn’t happened yet.”

http://www.freemalaysiatoday.com/2011/11/24/inside-the-world-of-a-radiation-victim/

 
 

July 17, 2025 Posted by | Resources -audiovicual, Uranium, wastes | Leave a comment

Tonnes of nuclear waste from Gentilly-1 secretly rolled down Quebec roads

A federal appeals court has already ruled that CNL and Canada’s nuclear regulator, the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission (CNSC), both acted improperly by not consulting the Kebaowek FN on the proposed “megadump” at Chalk River.

Shockingly, many of the radioactive species proposed for permanent storage in that earthen mound – the megadump, the NSDF – will remain dangerous for tens of thousands of years. 

Gordon Edwards, 15 July 25

Since 2015, a consortium of multinational corporations led by two American firms has been contracted by the Government of Canada to “manage” all federally-owned nuclear facilities and all federally-owned radioactive waste. 

The consortium, operating under the banner of Canadian Nuclear Laboratories (CNL), has already been paid several billions of dollars from the Canadian treasury. In September a new consortium of three American multinationals is slated to take over the reins of CNL
 and will continue to receive close to a billion dollars a year of federal tax dollars.

There is a federal petition in the House of Commons calling on the government to pause the contract until a federal audit has been conducted to determine where all that money is going. If you are a Canadian citizen, please sign your name to that petition and tell your friends and colleagues about it.
The article below indicates that all the high-level radioactive waste – used nuclear fuel – from the defunct Gentilly-1 nuclear reactor in Quebec has been secretly transported to Chalk River Ontario by the consortium, even though its current licence does not authorize such a transfer.

In typical grandiose fashion, CNL spokespersons boast that the consortium has “eliminated” a major liability. In actual fact the high-level waste has merely been moved upstream, to Chalk River, right on the border of Quebec, right beside the Ottawa river that flows down to Montreal. 
There is no mention of how much Canadians have had to pay the consortium for this operation, which was both unnecessary and ill-advised. The high-level waste cannot stay at Chalk River, it will have to be moved again at further taxpayer expense – because there is as yet no permanent home for any such highly radiotoxic waste – waste that will remain dangerous for many hundreds of thousands of years.

CNL falsely claims that municipalities and indigenous people were fully informed about the shipments. This is not true. For example, Keboawek First Nation (on whose ancestral land Chalk River is situated) was completely blind-sided by the Gentilly-1 radioactive waste being imported onto their territory without their full prior and informed consent, as required by law. 

A federal appeals court has already ruled that CNL and Canada’s nuclear regulator, the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission (CNSC), both acted improperly by not consulting the Kebaowek FN on the proposed “megadump” at Chalk River. KFN knew nothing about this operation until after it was completed. You cannot consult someone about a “fait accompli”.
The Chalk River megadump – euphemistically called the Near Surface Disposal Facility (NSDF) – is intended to hold a million tons of so-called “low level radioactive waste” in a glorified landfill operation perched on a height of land not far from the Ottawa River.

Shockingly, many of the radioactive species proposed for permanent storage in that earthen mound – the megadump, the NSDF – will remain dangerous for tens of thousands of years. 
The megadump has been opposed by over a hundred Quebec municipalities, including the City of Montreal and its “agglomeration” partners. As far as we can determine, none of these municipalities were notified or consulted about the Gentilly-1 waste shipments.

Has Canada granted American multinational corporations, all of them closely linked to the American nuclear weapons program, “carte blanche” to do what it likes without even notifying or consulting those Canadians that are most directly affected by their actions?
CNL is concentrating all federally-owned radioactive wastes of human origin at Chalk River, right across from Quebec, on a river that empties into the St. Lawrence River at Montreal. Large volumes of radioactive waste from Quebec and Manitoba, as well as from Kincardine and Rolphton in Ontario, is being accumulated at this one location  It is astonishing that the present Quebec government has absolutely nothing to say about this.

Past Quebec leaders have had the audacity to speak up. When Quebec activists intervened to prevent a high level nuclear waste dump in Vermont, Premier Bourassa stated that Quebec would never allow a permanent nuclear waste repository “in its territory or on its frontiers”. The Quebec National Assembly passed a unanimous resolution against the import of radioactive waste into Quebec for permanent disposal. Just on the border is OK?
Apparently, out of sight is out of mind. How times have changed….

The operation was completed at the end of June, after several months.

Sylvain Larocque, Le Journal de Montréal, 14 July 2025, https://tinyurl.com/msasbd4w

Over the past few months, dozens of trucks have been secretly driving the roads of Quebec to transport tonnes of irradiated fuel from the Gentilly-1 plant in Bécancour to Chalk River, Ontario.

– Also read: Hydro-Québec CEO Michael Sabia cautious on the nuclear issue

– Also read: Looking back: the nuclear adventure lasted only 29 years in Quebec

How many convoys were there?

Where exactly did they go?

It’s impossible to know.

‘To ensure the safe and secure transport of these materials, we cannot divulge specific information about the routes,’ Alexandra Riopelle, a spokeswoman for the Canadian Nuclear Laboratories (CNL), which was responsible for the operation, told Le Journal.

In all, there were 2985 fuel bundles to be transferred. These contained 62.8 tonnes of uranium, occupying a total volume of 12.1 cubic metres.

The trips began last autumn and ended a fortnight ago,” says Ms Riopelle.

Protected by the provincial police (Sûreté du Québec)

Quebec police officers provided security for each of the convoys.

‘I can confirm that we saw these materials being transported,’ says Sûreté du Québec inspector Richard Gauthier, although he declined to give any further details.

CNL, a consortium made up of the engineering firms Atkins-Réalis (formerly SNC-Lavalin), Jacobs and Fluor [both based in Texas], discreetly issued a press release last week highlighting the ‘success’ of the ‘removal of fuel from Gentilly-1, more quickly than expected’.

‘Canadian Nuclear Laboratories has eliminated a major nuclear liability and paved the way for the next stages in the decommissioning’ of the former experimental power station, which operated intermittently from 1972 to 1977, the organisation declared in a tone of self-congratulation.

No clear announcement

However, CNL has never made a clear announcement about the start of transport activities. In the spring of 2025, CNL provided information [no details!] on the decommissioning of Gentilly-1, but the question of transporting nuclear waste was only vaguely addressed.

It was a Montreal citizen, Jacques Dagenais, who alerted Le Journal in May. ‘If there were an accident, half the Montreal and Gatineau-Ottawa regions would have to be evacuated,’ he said. 

Although the nuclear waste from Gentilly-1 left the Centre-du-Québec region, it did not go very far: the Chalk River Laboratories are located on the banks of the Ottawa River, a stone’s throw from Quebec.

Gordon Edwards, a well-known anti-nuclear campaigner, also condemns the transport of spent fuel from Gentilly-1.

‘Even after 40 years, irradiated fuel still emits significant quantities of radioactivity’, he says. [Correction: it is not radioactivity that is emitted; radioactive materials emit ‘ionizing radiation’ often referred to as ‘atomic radiation’]

Terrorist risks

Guy Marleau, a professor at Polytechnique Montréal, maintains that it is to reduce risks, particularly terrorist risks, that nuclear waste shipments are not announced in advance.

“We make sure that the transport is carried out at times and on routes where the risk of collision is minimised,” explains the expert. As far as possible, we try to avoid crossing watercourses…. 

“Even if there is a collision with fire, the fuel is protected. The thing we’re most afraid of is it ending up at the bottom of a river.”

CNL asserts that it has notified the municipalities and aboriginal communities along the convoy route. The town of Bécancour and the Abenakis of Wôlinak did not reply to the Journal on this subject.

‘Quebec is notified and consulted’ when highly reactive waste is transported, ‘to ensure that risks are properly managed’, says Marjorie Larouche, spokesperson for the Ministry of the Environment.

As for Hydro-Québec’s Gentilly-2 power station, which ceased operations in 2012, its decommissioning [dismantling] could also be accelerated. It is not yet known whether its irradiated fuel will remain on site or be shipped elsewhere in Canada.

July 17, 2025 Posted by | Canada, wastes | Leave a comment

We must count the real costs of nuclear power

Letter: Your author, in his enthusiasm to highlight the cheaper costs to
build new nuclear plants, failed to include the ever-increasing costs of
decommissioning nuclear plants at the end of their working life. This must
be included in any comparison of costs. He also failed to mention the
problems of vast amounts of highly dangerous radioactive nuclear waste and
accidents, freak weather – such as the tsunamis causing radioactive leaks
in Japan – and potential terrorist attacks. Nuclear may not cause
atmospheric carbon waste but it does create hugely toxic radioactive waste
that remains dangerous for hundreds of thousands of years. A problem that
threatens the health of all life.

 Guardian 9th July 2025, https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/jul/09/we-must-count-the-real-costs-of-nuclear-power

July 13, 2025 Posted by | wastes | Leave a comment

From Scotland to Cumbria – Not All Waste Is Equal.

Next week Cumberland Councillors will be asking questions about the
“unacceptable” transport of wastes from Scotland to Cumbrian landfill.
Meanwhile the transport of thousands of tonnes of radioactive wastes from
Scotland to Cumbrian landfill continues entirely unchallenged.

Letter belowto Cumberland councillors and Scotland’s First Minister John Swinney.

Dear Councillor Dobson, Councillor Rollo and First Minister John Swinney,
Radiation Free Lakeland agree completely with the reported statement by
Scotland’s First Minister, that the situation of landfill waste arriving
from Scotland into England and specifically Cumbria is “not
acceptable..” A related issue of great concern is that so called High
Volume Very Low Level and Exempt Radioactive wastes from Scotland are being
increasingly diverted to landfill. We note that the Low Level Waste
Repository (LLWR) at Drigg, Cumbria, now only accepts less than 5% of waste
with the remainder being diverted to recycling (radioactive scrap metal),
landfills or via incineration.

Radiation Free Lakeland 6th July 2025, https://radiationfreelakeland.substack.com/p/from-scotland-to-cumbria-not-all

July 13, 2025 Posted by | UK, wastes | Leave a comment

Tepco plans to move spent nuclear fuel from Fukushima to Mutsu facility

 Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings (Tepco) suggested Monday that it
plans to transfer spent nuclear fuel from its Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power
plant to an interim storage facility in the city of Mutsu in Aomori
Prefecture. The plan was included in a medium- to long-term program for the
facility, presented to Aomori Gov. Soichiro Miyashita by Tepco President
Tomoaki Kobayakawa at a meeting in the Aomori Prefectural Government office
the same day.

Spent nuclear fuel stored at the plant’s No. 5 and No. 6
reactors, a joint storage pool and the Fukushima No. 2 plant at the time of
the March 2011 nuclear meltdown at the No. 1 plant is set to be transferred
to the Mutsu facility.

 Japan Times 8th July 2025, https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2025/07/08/japan/tepco-move-mutsu/

July 12, 2025 Posted by | Japan, wastes | Leave a comment

Plutonium Levels in Sediments Remain Elevated 70 Years After Nuclear Tests

 June 24, 2025,
https://www.marinetechnologynews.com/news/plutonium-levels-sediments-remain-650328

Researchers from Edith Cowan University (ECU) in Australia have confirmed plutonium levels in sediment up to 4,500 times greater than the Western Australian coastline.

Three plutonium-based nuclear weapons tests were conducted at the Montebello Islands in the 1950’s, which introduced radioactive contamination to the surrounding environment. The first nuclear test, coded Operation Hurricane, had a weapon’s yield of some 25kT, and formed a crater in the seabed, while the second and third tests, dubbed Operation Mosaic G1 and G2, had weapons yields of around 15kT and 60kT, respectively.

The three tests released radioactive isotopes including plutonium, strontium (90Sr) and caesium (137Cs) into the surrounding marine environment.

“Plutonium is anthropogenic, which means that it doesn’t exist on its own in nature. The only way it is introduced into an environment is through the detonation of nuclear weapons and from releases from nuclear reprocessing plants and, to a lesser extent, accidents in nuclear power plants,” said ECU PhD student and lead author Madison Williams-Hoffman.

“When plutonium is released into a coastal setting in the marine environment, a significant fraction will attach to particles and accumulate in the seabed, while some may be transported long distances by oceanic currents.”

The region is not inhabited by humans and has not been developed, however it is visited by fishing boats, so collecting data on the levels of contamination in the marine environment is important.

Currently, the protected island archipelago and surrounding marine areas also reside within the Montebello Islands Marine Park (MIMP). The MIMP is ecologically significant due to the presence of numerous permanent or migratory species, and its high-value habitat is used for breeding and rearing by fish, mammals, birds and other marine wildlife.

The water and sediment quality within the MIMP are currently described as ‘generally pristine’, and it is fundamental to maintain healthy marine ecosystems in the region.

The concentrations of plutonium at Montebello Islands were between 4 to 4,500 times higher than those found in sediment from Kalumburu and Rockingham from the Western Australian coastline, with the northern area of the archipelago, close to the three detonation sites, having four-fold higher levels than the southern area.

The concentrations of plutonium found in the sediment at Montebello Islands were similar to those found in the sediment at the Republic of Marshall Islands (RMI) test sites, despite 700-fold higher detonation yields from nuclear testing undertaken at RMI.

Plutonium is an alpha emitter so, unlike other types of radiation, it cannot travel through the skin and is most dangerous when ingested or inhaled.

The research was undertaken by Williams-Hoffman, under the co-supervision of Prof. Pere Masqueand at ECU and Dr Mathew Johansen at ANTSO.

June 26, 2025 Posted by | - plutonium, AUSTRALIA, OCEANIA | Leave a comment

Supreme Court clears the way for temporary nuclear waste storage in Texas and New Mexico

By ASSOCIATED PRESS, 19 June 2025, https://www.dailymail.co.uk/wires/ap/article-14825147/Supreme-Court-clears-way-temporary-nuclear-waste-storage-Texas-New-Mexico.html

WASHINGTON (AP) – The Supreme Court on Wednesday restarted plans to temporarily store nuclear waste at sites in rural Texas and New Mexico, even as the nation is at an impasse over a permanent solution.

The justices, by a 6-3 vote, reversed a federal appeals court ruling that invalidated the license granted by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to a private company for the facility in southwest Texas. The outcome should also reinvigorate plans for a similar facility in New Mexico roughly 40 miles (65 kilometers) away.

The federal appeals court in New Orleans had ruled in favor of the opponents of the facilities.

The licenses would allow the companies to operate the facilities for 40 years, with the possibility of a 40-year renewal.

The court’s decision is not a final ruling in favor of the licenses, but it removes a major roadblock. Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s majority opinion focused on technical procedural rules in concluding that Texas and a major landowner in southwest Texas forfeited their right to challenge the NRC licensing decision in federal court.

The justices did not rule on a more substantive issue: whether federal law allows the commission to license temporary storage sites. But Kavanaugh wrote that “history and precedent offer significant support for the commission´s longstanding interpretation” that it can do so.

Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote in dissent that the NRC’s “decision was unlawful” because spent nuclear fuel can be temporarily stored in only two places under federal law, at a nuclear reactor or at a federally owned facility. Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas signed on to the dissenting opinion.

Roughly 100,000 tons (90,000 metric tons) of spent fuel, some of it dating from the 1980s, is piling up at current and former nuclear plant sites nationwide and growing by more than 2,000 tons (1,800 metric tons) a year. The waste was meant to be kept there temporarily before being deposited deep underground.

The NRC has said that the temporary storage sites are needed because existing nuclear plants are running out of room. The presence of the spent fuel also complicates plans to decommission some plants, the Justice Department said in court papers.

Plans for a permanent underground storage facility at Yucca Mountain, northwest of Las Vegas, are stalled because of staunch opposition from most Nevada residents and officials.

The NRC´s appeal was filed by the Biden administration and maintained by the Trump administration. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, a Republican, and New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, a Democrat, are leading bipartisan opposition to the facilities in their states.

Lujan Grisham said she was deeply disappointed by the court´s ruling, reiterating that Holtec International, awarded the license for the New Mexico facility, wasn´t welcome in the state. She vowed to do everything possible to prevent the company, based in Jupiter, Florida, from storing what she called “dangerous” waste in New Mexico.

“Congress has repeatedly failed to secure a permanent location for disposing of nuclear waste, and now the federal government is trying to force de-facto permanent storage facilities onto New Mexico and Texas,” she said. “It is a dangerous and irresponsible approach.”

The NRC granted the Texas license to Interim Storage Partners, based in Andrews, Texas, for a facility that could take up to 5,500 tons (5,000 metric tons) of spent nuclear fuel rods from power plants and 231 million tons (210 million metric tons) of other radioactive waste. The facility would be built next to an existing dump site in Andrews County for low-level waste such as protective clothing and other material that has been exposed to radioactivity. The Andrews County site is about 350 miles (560 kilometers) west of Dallas, near the Texas-New Mexico state line.

The New Mexico facility would be in Lea County, in the southeastern part of the state near Carlsbad.

Associated Press writer Susan Montoya Bryan contributed to this report from Albuquerque, N.M. 

June 22, 2025 Posted by | Legal, wastes | Leave a comment

Inside Britain’s top nuclear bunker.

 Secure vaults containing decades-old enriched uranium and plutonium are
dotted across Britain’s sprawling atomic weapons establishment site in
the Berkshire countryside. Some are underground, inside 1960s-era
buildings, guarded by police on the roof tops armed with C8 Carbine assault
rifles used by the Special Air Service (SAS).

Cameras keep watch and
security guards patrol the perimeter — lined by a fence and razor wire,
like a prison — and 56 dogs are on hand to sniff out any sign of toxic
chemicals. “The guards and guns are not here to protect us, they are here
to protect the material,” said one of the scientists giving a tour of the
grounds. “You can’t get anywhere near them [the vaults] even if you
tried,” added another.

 Times 19th June 2025,
https://www.thetimes.com/uk/defence/article/uk-nuclear-uranium-bunker-fr6szg6tn

June 21, 2025 Posted by | UK, wastes | Leave a comment

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