Nuclear fuel return ‘shames BNFL’
Declaring the protest on the Irish Sea a success, a Greenpeace spokesperson said: “Today is a final humiliation for BNFL after a three-year, 36,000-mile round trip. Its reject plutonium is now back where it started.
“In the course of the journey, BNFL has taken great risks with environmental safety, ignored the protests of 80 countries around the world and outraged public opinion on four continents.
“It seems that the only thing they are good at is offending people. The main thing we wanted to do was bear witness to what was happening and let BNFL know that people were very unhappy with what they were doing.”
Five tonnes of plutonium mixed oxide fuel (MOX) in 100-tonne armoured casks, were lifted by crane from nuclear freighter Pacific Pintail, on to a train under armed police guard, before being transported to the Sellafield plant.
The BNFL-owned vessel docked at the Marine Terminal in Barrow-in-Furness, Cumbria, yesterday morning. Sister ship Pacific Teal, not thought to be carrying fuel, docked at the same port.
Both ships have completed a controversial journey across the globe which began when they left Takahama in Japan in July en route for the Cumbrian port.
Casks containing the fuel were bolted down in the ships designed to withstand collision and remain buoyant. The ships were armed.
As the Pacific Pintail entered the final stretch of Walney Channel before reaching the port, it was followed by a flotilla of protesters’ boats flying banners bearing “Stop Plutonium Transport”.
Navy vessels and spotter aircraft were also deployed by the British Government to monitor the BNFL ships as they sailed off the Irish coast.
Sinn Féin environment spokesperson Arthur Morgan said an international alliance was needed to block further transport of nuclear fuel.
Speaking from a vessel in the anti-nuclear flotilla, Mr Morgan said: “The Irish Sea protest against the transportation of BNFL’s nuclear fuel has served to highlight in a dramatic way the dangers involved in this practice.
“However, these protests in themselves cannot bring it to an end. We need to build an international alliance of non-nuclear countries who will work with
national and international environmental and peace groups to make the extremely dangerous practice impossible,” he said.
A BNFL spokesman said countries were entitled to their opinions, but much concern stemmed from a misunderstanding over the risk from the fuel.
He said it had not been used in a reactor, which meant its levels of radiation were “very low”.
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