Sellafield must run for 50 years more, says BNFL

THE Sellafield nuclear processing plant will have to stay up and running for at least another 50 years, British Nuclear Fuels safety chief said in Dublin last night.

Arguing against the calls to shut down Sellafield, BNFL Sellafield head of environment, health, safety and quality John Clarke said it was simply not an option.

“While some activities could be stopped that would have consequences that might be more undesirable than having those activities continue,” he said.

Speaking at the Fianna Fáil Dublin Forum debate on the future of Sellafield last night, Mr Clarke said the management of the historic legacy of wastes at the site will require ongoing intervention for probably another 50 years.

“Putting it bluntly, it would not be safe to shut down Sellafield,” he said.

The history of the British military and civil nuclear programme has left waste material and redundant plants that need to be treated, Mr Clarke said.

“Right now, there are more than 22 decommissioning projects in progress at Sellafield. The most high profile of these are the decommissioning of the old Windscale Piles, the site of the Windscale Fire in 1957, and the celebrated golfball prototype Advanced Gas-cooled Reactor,” he said.

The condemnation directed at BNFL by politicians, campaigners and the media for not revealing the security measures at Sellafield are not reasonable, Mr Clarke said.

The effectiveness of the security arrangements would immediately be compromised if the details were published, he said.

“Governments determine security policies and the rules on their disclosure, not the operators or owners of installations, whether these are airports, chemical plants or civil nuclear sites such as Sellafield,” he said.

Pointing out that it was British government policy not to divulge details of security arrangements, he said Irish government policy on disclosure of increased security measures at Irish airports is similar.

Defending BNFL’s record on transport, Mr Clarke said the company had made 4.5 million miles of transport of radioactive cargoes by sea in the past 30 years without a single incident resulting in the release of radioactivity.

“Safety is not about the absence of risk, nor is it about the removal of risk. Rather it is about the management of risk to reduce it to an acceptable level,” he said.

Describing some of the declarations on Sellafield as alarmist and untruths, Mr Clarke said BNFL was trying to provide facts and balance.