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Cumbria ponders on hosting UK’s underground radioactive waste dump

The anticipated footprint of the underground facilities ranges from 2.32 square miles to 8.88 square miles, depending on rock type and the amount and type of waste to be disposed of.

The Government has said deep geological disposal is the best way to dispose of higher activity radioactive waste. The waste is currently stored above ground at 36 UK sites, with most of it at Sellafield.

NUCLEAR DUMP COULD BE AS BIG AS WORKINGTON, Times & StarNews, 24 August 2012 An underground nuclear dump in West Cumbria would be about the size of Workington, a report has revealed. West Cumbria Managing Radioactive Waste Safely Partnership, which published its final report this week, said it would take at least 15 years to find a site.

Twenty-five per cent of West Cumbria has already been ruled out as unsuitable for an underground nuclear waste dump, the report said, and more work would be needed before it would be known if any of the area would be able to host the site. Continue reading →

August 25, 2012 Posted by | UK, wastes | Leave a comment

UK’s dangerous plan to make its piles of nuclear waste a commercial asset

Britain’s previous attempts to convert plutonium into Mox fuel which could then be burned in conventional reactors have proved disastrous, culminating in the premature closure last year of the £1.34bn Sellafield Mox Plant, which was a commercial and technical failure.

‘Untested’ nuclear reactors may be used to burn up plutonium waste Feasibility study looks at building revolutionary new facility at Sellafield to dispose of stockpile  The Independent, STEVE CONNOR     20 AUGUST 2012 An ambitious plan to rid Britain of its civil plutonium stockpile – the biggest in the world – has come a step closer with the submission of a feasibility study for building revolutionary nuclear reactors to “burn” the waste at Sellafield in Cumbria.

The plan envisages the construction of twin nuclear “fast reactors” at Sellafield that can dispose of the plutonium directly as fuel to generate electricity while ridding the country of a nuclear-waste headache that has dogged governments for half a century. Continue reading →

August 20, 2012 Posted by | reprocessing, UK | Leave a comment

British government’s PR for the nuclear industry – playing down Fukushima risk

 The Conservative MP Zac Goldsmith, who sits on the Commons environmental audit committee, condemned the extent of co-ordination between the government and nuclear companies that the emails appear to reveal.

“The government has no business doing PR for the industry and it would be appalling if its departments have played down the impact of Fukushima,” he said.

Revealed: British government’s plan to play down Fukushima Internal emails seen by Guardian show PR campaign was launched to protect UK nuclear plans after tsunami in Japan • Read the emails here  Guardian UK, 19 Aug 12, 

British government officials approached nuclear companies to draw up a co-ordinated public relations strategy to play down the Fukushimanuclear accident just two days after the earthquake and tsunami in Japanand before the extent of the radiation leak was known. Continue reading →

August 20, 2012 Posted by | politics, Reference, secrets,lies and civil liberties, UK | 2 Comments

China to be in charge of Britain’s new nuclear power?

The potential for political conflict has been highlighted …  “They [the Chinese] will be inside the system, with access to the intricate architecture of the UK’s National Grid and the processes through which electricity supply is controlled, as well as to the UK’s nuclear technology.”

Security fears shelved amid China nuclear bid FT.com By Jim Pickard, Anousha Sakoui and Rebecca Bream, 19 Aug 12

“……..the attempt [China’s} to buy into Britain’s nuclear programme marks a significant change of gear. Not only will this be the first investment into new build projects in the UK – as opposed to takeovers of existing assets – it is also in a controversial sector.



For China, the project provides an opportunity to showcase its expertise in an OECD country. “If you can be at the top table in the UK, that’s a great selling point around the world,” said one of the people close to the Horizon project……. Continue reading →

August 20, 2012 Posted by | safety, UK | Leave a comment

UK’s plans for nuclear waste burial in Cumbria

Full report published on Cumbria nuclear waste burial and local involvement  http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/the-northerner/2012/aug/17/lakedistrict-nuclearpower-west-cumbria-managing-nuclear-waste-safely-partnership?newsfeed=true
by   17 August 2012 Findings of three-year review by the West Cumbria Managing Radioactive Waste Safely Partnership are now in print and online The complicated and contentious issue of burying nuclear waste in Cumbria is heading for a milestone on 11 October when the three local councils which have expressed an interest meet to debate further involvement.

A useful waymarker has now been published in full, based on the views of some 2,300 people and organisations whose submissions, while often very different and sometimes in direct conflict, have led to changes and hesitations, albeit not altering the general approach of cautiously making headway.

The document was summarised on 19 July and you can read a precis of that here. The full report has now gone up online and that is availablehere. It is the work of the West Cumbria Managing Radioactive Waste Safely Partnership which is made up of the councils – Cumbria countyand Allerdale and Copeland districts – and other groups including the National Farmers Union, the Lake District national park authority and representatives of all the parish councils potentially involved.  Continue reading →

August 18, 2012 Posted by | Reference, UK, wastes | Leave a comment

Clear that USA pursues Julian Assange, while Australian government feigns ignorance

US in pursuit of Assange, cables reveal,The Age, August 18, 2012, Philip DorlingAUSTRALIAN diplomats have no doubt the United States is still gunning for Julian Assange, according to Foreign Affairs Department documents obtained by The Saturday Age. The Australian embassy in Washington has been tracking a US espionage investigation targeting the WikiLeaks publisher for more than 18 months.

The declassified diplomatic cables, released under freedom of information laws, show Australia’s diplomatic service takes seriously the likelihood that Assange will eventually be extradited to the US on charges arising from WikiLeaks obtaining leaked US military and diplomatic documents.

This view is at odds with Foreign Minister Bob Carr’s repeated dismissal of such a prospect. Continue reading →

August 18, 2012 Posted by | AUSTRALIA, secrets,lies and civil liberties, UK, USA | Leave a comment

Scotland CAN get to %100 renewable energy

100% renewable energy ‘attainable’
http://www.strathearnherald.co.uk/strathearn-news/scottish-news/2012/08/10/100-renewable-energy-attainable-64054-31597089/ Aug 10 2012 The ambition to generate 100% of Scotland’s electricity from renewable sources by 2020 could be within reach, a report has suggested.
Scotland’s Renewable Energy Sector In Numbers – an online portal by industry body Scottish Renewables which pulls together figures from a range of sources – shows figures on energy capacity, output, jobs and investment, and emissions which were buried away in dense government reports. Continue reading →

August 11, 2012 Posted by | renewable, UK | Leave a comment

Nuclear company’s financial burden, trying to sell to UK

EDF open to partners on UK nuclear scheme, Ft.com, July 31, 2012  By James Boxell in Paris EDF  of France is seeking partners to share the financial burden of its project to build four atomic reactors in the UK, sparking fresh concerns about whether nuclear energy is becoming too expensive.
The cost of atomic power was called into question this week by Jeff Immelt, chief executive of General Electric , who said it had become “really hard” to justify compared with cheap shale gas.

The UK wants to replace ageing nuclear reactors but it is locked in negotiations with EDF – the world’s largest supplier of atomic energy by kilowatt hours – over setting a price for electricity that would justify the heavy investment.

EDF said on Tuesday it would decide this year whether to push on with the first UK facility in Somerset. But Thomas Piquemal, finance director, said it was looking at cutting its 80 per cent share of the project to spread the risk. The UK’s Centrica  owns the other 20 per cent of the four-reactor consortium.

“We are thinking about the best ways of financing this and attracting new partners,” Mr Piquemal said.

EDF is 84 per cent-owned by the French state, but private shareholders are worried about spiralling costs in the UK unless favourable terms are offered. The company is planning to build next-generation EPR reactors, which have suffered big cost overruns in France and Finland.

RWE  and EON  of Germany abandoned plans to build reactors in the UK because of increasing industry costs, which have jumped since the nuclear disaster in Fukushima in Japan last year http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/49b4ef00-daea-11e1-8074-00144feab49a.html#axzz22Kejy7Ba

August 1, 2012 Posted by | business and costs, UK | Leave a comment

PRISM nuclear reactor won’t solve UK’s plutonium problem

Adrian Simper, the strategy director of the UK’s Nuclear Decommissioning Authority,  warned last November in an internal memorandum that fast reactors were “not credible” as a solution to Britain’s plutonium problem because they had “still to be demonstrated commercially” and could not be deployed within 25 years.

 the plutonium metal, once prepared for the reactor, would be even more vulnerable to theft for making bombs than the powdered oxide.

Are fast-breeder reactors the answer to our nuclear waste nightmare? The Guardian 30 July 12 The battle is intensifying on a decision over a major fast-breeder reactor to deal with the plutonium waste at Sellafield.  “…….Britain has a history of embarrassing failures with MOX, including the closure last year of a $2 billion blending plant that spent 10 years producing a scant amount of fuel. And critics say that, even if it works properly, MOX fuel is an expensive way of generating not much energy, while leaving most of the plutonium intact, albeit in a less dangerous form.

Only fast reactors can consume the plutonium. Many think that will ultimately be the UK choice. If so, the PRISM plant would take five years to license, five years to build, and could destroy probably the world’s most dangerous stockpile of plutonium by the end of the 2020s. GEH has not publicly put a cost on building the plant, but it says it will foot the bill, with the British government only paying by results, as the plutonium is destroyed.
The idea of fast breeders as the ultimate goal of nuclear power engineering goes back to the 1950s, when experts predicted that fast-breeders would generate all Britain’s electricity by the 1970s. But the Clinton administration eventually shut down the U.S.’s research program in 1994. Britain followed soon after, shutting its Dounreay fast-breeder reactor on the north coast of Scotland in 1995. Continue reading →

July 31, 2012 Posted by | reprocessing, UK | Leave a comment

Supercomputer Powered By Solar Panels, by Energy Matters, 31 July 12 A supercomputer used by Britain’s Met Office (the equivalent of Australia’s Bureau of Meteorology) is now powered by solar panels. The solar panel array will generate 221,000 kW hours of electricity per year – enough energy to power 67 UK households – and will avoid around 116 tonnes of carbon emissions annually.

  Installed on the rooftop of the Met Office’s Exeter HQ Energy Centre, the array is linked to an electricity management system allowing for real-time monitoring of the panels’ performance The 250kW solar power system consists of 1,000 solar modules. The system was installed by UK company Sungift Solar.

Drawing on more than 10 million weather observations each 24 hours, an advanced atmospheric model and three high performance supercomputers are used to create 3,000 tailored forecasts and briefings a day.

Among the Met Office’s other sustainability efforts in relation to its supercomputers is a Direct Current (DC) power project; a system that is delivering a 10% power reduction and a £200,000 electricity cost saving per year.
The organisation has also invested in evaporative free cooling for its supercomputers. Large tanks installed on the roof of its headquarters in Exeter allow for cooling at ambient temperature outside the building for much of the time, rather than total reliance on mechanical cooling. …. http://www.energymatters.com.au/index.php?main_page=news_article&article_id=3318

July 31, 2012 Posted by | renewable, UK | Leave a comment

What has happened with UK’s nuclear Polaris missiles?

Faslane and Coulport nuclear weapons maintenance to be privatised – Polaris? For Argyll.com  July 28, 2012  The Ministry of Defence (MoD) has made a contractual commitment to hand over to a private sector consortium the maintenance of the UK’s nuclear weapons – described by the BBC as ‘Trident and Polaris weapons systems’ – held in Argyll at Faslane and Coulport on the Clyde.

This raises an immediate public information issue.

What is our position on the Polaris system? It was quite a shock to see it mentioned, like a rising from almost forgotten history. Polaris – and are we storing redundant warheads? Continue reading →

July 30, 2012 Posted by | history, UK, weapons and war | Leave a comment

NUKES TO GO PRIVATE  PRIVATE Daily Star 29 July 12  “… contractors are to take over the maintenance of the UK’s nuclear weapons in Scotland.
The MoD has signed a 15-year deal with a consortium to provide support for the Trident weapons ­ system at the Royal Navy’s Clyde bases.
Under the contract 149 MoD civilian posts will transfer to thecontractor, ABL Alliance…..
http://www.dailystar.co.uk/news/view/264444/Nukes-to-go-private/

July 30, 2012 Posted by | UK, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Oak Ridge Y-12 Indicted for War Crimes

Statement from Transform Plowshares about Y-12 nuclear weapons facility. 29 July 12 Courtesy: disarmnowplowshares.wordpress.com

Oak Ridge Y-12 Indicted for War Crimes“Today, through our nonviolent action, we—Transform Now Plowshares—indict the U.S. government nuclear modernization program,

including the new Uranium Processing Facility planned at Oak Ridge and the dedication of billions of public dollars to the continuation of the Y-12 facility.

WHEREAS, This program is an ongoing criminal endeavor in violation of international treaty law binding on the United States under the supremacy clause of the U.S. Constitution (Article VI): Continue reading →

July 30, 2012 Posted by | Reference, UK, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Opposition to privatisation of UK’s nuclear weapons management

Faslane and Coulport nuclear weapons maintenance to be privatised – Polaris?
For Argyll.com  July 28, 2012   “….Privatisation of maintenance of nuclear weapons – no new notion The privatisation of security which produced the inglorious G4S failure, undermined public confidence in the organisation of the ongoing 2012 Olympic Games in London. One would therefore have expected some gesture of consultation with the Scottish government and the Scottish people on any plan to privatise the maintenance of nuclear weapons here. Continue reading →

July 30, 2012 Posted by | UK, weapons and war | Leave a comment

UK hastening plan to bury radioactive waste

Govt fast-tracks nuclear dumps despite warnings, The Independent/London, 29 July 12 The burial of radioactive nuclear waste is to be fast-tracked by the government despite warnings about the risks.
Ministers have revealed an “enduring ambition” for Britain’s first burial of waste from nuclear power stations to happen as early as 2029, instead of 2040 as originally planned, The Independent on Sunday revealed. Continue reading →

July 30, 2012 Posted by | UK, wastes | Leave a comment

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