Latest news with #Sellafield
The Independent
3 hours ago
- Health
- The Independent
Britain's ‘most hazardous building' could leak radioactive water for 30 more years, MPs warn
A report by MPs has warned that one of Britain's most dangerous buildings may continue to leak radioactive water well into the 2050s, as decommissioning efforts at Sellafield struggle to keep pace. The Commons Public Accounts Committee (PAC) released a report on Wednesday, criticising the slow progress of decommissioning work at the former nuclear power plant, citing "failure, cost overruns, and continuing safety concerns". PAC chairman Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown acknowledged "signs of improvement" but stressed that Sellafield continues to pose "intolerable risks". He said that the scale of the decommissioning project makes it difficult to grasp the urgency of safety hazards and cost overruns. "Every day at Sellafield is a race against time to complete works before buildings reach the end of their life," he said, adding that the report indicates Sellafield risks losing this race. The Magnox Swarf Storage Silo (MSSS), described by the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA) as "the most hazardous building in the UK," highlights these risks. Since 2018, the MSSS has been leaking radioactive water into the ground, releasing enough water to fill an Olympic swimming pool every three years. This leakage is expected to persist until the oldest section of the building is emptied in the 2050s, approximately a decade later than initially projected. Pointing to the fact that Sellafield Ltd had missed most of its annual targets for retrieving waste from buildings, including the MSSS, the committee warned: 'The consequence of this underperformance is that the buildings are likely to remain extremely hazardous for longer.' The NDA has acknowledged that the leak is its 'single biggest environmental issue', and a spokeswoman said managing it and retrieving waste from the MSSS was 'our highest priority'. She added: 'As the report says, the leak in the Magnox Swarf Storage Silo is contained and does not pose a risk to the public. Regulators accept that the current plan to tackle the leak is the most effective one.' Sir Geoffrey said: 'It is of vital importance that the Government grasp the daily urgency of the work taking place at Sellafield, and shed any sense of a far-off date of completion for which no-one currently living is responsible. 'Sellafield's risks and challenges are those of the present day. 'There are some early indications of some improvement in Sellafield's delivery, which our report notes. Government must do far more to hold all involved immediately accountable to ensure these do not represent a false dawn, and to better safeguard both the public purse and the public itself.' Sellafield ceased generating electricity in 2003 and, in addition to work cleaning up the site, now processes and stores nuclear waste from power plants around the UK. In the longer term, the Government plans to create an underground geological disposal facility (GDF) to store nuclear waste for the thousands of years it will take to become safe. But the committee said delays in creating the GDF, which is now not expected to be done until the late 2050s, meant more costs for Sellafield as it required more storage facilities. NDA chief executive David Peattie said he welcomed the PAC's scrutiny and would consider how best to address its recommendations. He said: 'We take the findings seriously and the safety of the site and the wellbeing of our people will always be our highest priorities. 'As the committee has noted, Sellafield is the most complex and challenging nuclear site in the UK. We are pleased they recognise improvements in delivering major projects and that we are safely retrieving waste from all four highest hazard facilities. 'With the support of our employees, their representatives, community and stakeholders, we remain committed to driving forward improved performance and continuing to deliver our nationally important mission safely, securely and sustainably.' As well as criticising delays in clean-up operations and calling for an overhaul of how the site functions, the PAC expressed concern that there was a 'sub-optimal culture' at Sellafield. The committee pointed to the 16 non-disclosure agreements signed by Sellafield Ltd in the last 16 years, and called on the NDA to publish information about the prevalence and perception of bullying in its annual report. The NDA spokeswoman said: 'We're committed to an open and respectful culture and we've taken decisive action to enable this, including strengthening our whistleblowing policy. 'Evidence shows the improvements are working and the report acknowledges the improvement in staff survey results over recent years, but we are never complacent and will continue to strive to ensure the NDA group is a place where everyone feels respected and empowered to raise issues, knowing that they will be acted upon appropriately. 'As the report notes, it is one of the conditions of Sellafield's nuclear site licence to have a robust process for reporting safety issues and the independent nuclear regulator has given the site a green rating of compliance.'
The Guardian
3 hours ago
- Business
- The Guardian
Sellafield nuclear clean-up too slow and too costly, say MPs
MPs have warned about the speed and cost of cleaning up the Sellafield nuclear waste dump and raised concerns over a 'suboptimal' workplace culture at the site. Members of parliament's public accounts committee (PAC) urged the government and bosses at the sprawling collection of crumbling buildings in Cumbria to get a grasp on the 'intolerable risks' presented by its ageing infrastructure. In a detailed report into the site, the PAC said Sellafield was not moving quickly enough to tackle its biggest hazards; raised the alarm over its culture; and said the government was not ensuring value for money was being achieved from taxpayer funds. In 2023, the Guardian's Nuclear Leaks investigation revealed a string of safety concerns at the site – including escalating fears over a leak of radioactive liquid from a decaying building known as the Magnox swarf storage silo (MSSS) – as well as cybersecurity failings and allegations of a poor workplace culture. The PAC – which heard evidence in March from Sellafield and its oversight body, the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA) – found that the state-owned company had missed most of its annual targets to retrieve waste from several buildings, including the MSSS. 'As a result of Sellafield's underperformance [the MSSS] will likely remain extremely hazardous for longer,' the MPs said. The ultimate cost of cleaning up Sellafield, which contains waste from weapons programmes and atomic power generation, has been estimated at £136bn and could take more than 100 years. Geoffrey Clifton-Brown, the chair of the PAC, said: 'Unfortunately, our latest report is interleaved with a number of examples of failure, cost overruns, and continuing safety concerns. Given the tens of billions at stake, and the dangers on site to both the environment and human life, this is simply not good enough.' He added: 'As with the fight against climate change, the sheer scale of the hundred-year timeframe of the decommissioning project makes it hard to grasp the immediacy of safety hazards and cost overruns that delays can have. 'Every day at Sellafield is a race against time to complete works before buildings reach the end of their life. Our report contains too many signs that this is a race that Sellafield risks losing.' MPs noted that one project, a now-paused replacement of an on-site lab, had resulted in '£127m wasted'. The cost of cleaning up Sellafield has caused tensions with the Treasury as the chancellor, Rachel Reeves, attempts to tighten public spending and spur growth. Sellafield, which is home to the world's largest store of plutonium, said in February that nearly £3bn in new funding was 'not enough'. Last year, Sellafield apologised and was fined £332,500 after it pleaded guilty to criminal charges over years of cybersecurity failings. The PAC noted that the timeline for a government project to create a long-term deep underground store for nuclear waste, including that held at Sellafield, had slipped from 2040 to the late 2050s. The government is considering sites in Cumbria and Lincolnshire, although Lincolnshire county council is expected to withdraw the latter from the process after vocal local opposition. The MPs said they had found 'indications of a suboptimal culture' at Sellafield, and noted that the NDA paid £377,200 in 2023-24 to settle employment-related claims. Alison McDermott, a former HR consultant who raised concerns over bullying and a 'toxic culture' at the site, said she felt 'vindicated' by the report. Sign up to Business Today Get set for the working day – we'll point you to all the business news and analysis you need every morning after newsletter promotion The PAC urged the government to set out how it would hold the NDA and Sellafield to account over its performance. It said Sellafield should report annually on progress against targets and explain how it is addressing the deteriorating condition of its assets. The NDA should publish data on the prevalence of bullying and harassment at nuclear sites, it said. Clifton-Brown said there were 'early indications of some improvements in Sellafield's delivery' but said the government needed to do 'far more' to ensure bosses safeguard the public and taxpayer funds. The NDA's chief executive, David Peattie, responding on behalf of Sellafield, said: 'We welcome the scrutiny of the committee and their report. We will now look in more detail at the recommendations and consider how best to address them. 'We take the findings seriously, and the safety of the site and the wellbeing of our people will always be our highest priorities.' A spokesperson for the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero said: 'We expect the highest standards of safety and security as former nuclear sites are dismantled, and the regulator is clear that public safety is not compromised at Sellafield. 'We continue to support the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority in its oversight of Sellafield, while driving value for money. This is underpinned by monthly performance reviews and increased responsibility for overseeing major project performance, enabling more direct scrutiny and intervention. 'We have zero-tolerance of bullying, harassment and offensive behaviour in the workplace – we expect Sellafield and the NDA to operate on this basis, investigate allegations and take robust action when needed.'
The Guardian
2 days ago
- Business
- The Guardian
Going Nuclear by Tim Gregory review – a boosterish case for atomic energy
There is something biblical about the fraternal relationship between the atomic bomb and the nuclear reactor. Both involve bombarding uranium-235 atoms with neutrons to produce a chain reaction via nuclear fission. Both were made possible in the same instant, at 3.25pm on 2 December 1942, when the Manhattan Project's Enrico Fermi orchestrated the first human-made chain reaction in the squash court of the University of Chicago. 'The flame of nuclear fission brought us to the forked road of promise and peril,' writes Tim Gregory. The bomb came first, of course, but atomic dread coexisted with tremendous optimism about what President Eisenhower dubbed 'atoms for peace': the potential of controlled fission to generate limitless energy. As David Lilienthal of the US Atomic Energy Commission observed, atom-splitting thus inspired a pseudo-religious binary: 'It would either destroy us all or it would bring about the millennium.' Nuclear optimism was shattered by the 1986 Chornobyl disaster but, as the subtitle of his book advertises, Gregory is determined to bring it back. A nuclear chemist at Sellafield, where the Queen opened the world's first commercial nuclear reactor in 1956, he's a cheerleader for Team Millennium. Writing in a Promethean spirit of 'rational and daring optimism', this self-proclaimed 'nuclear environmentalist' believes nuclear energy is the only viable route to net zero by 2050. 'The nucleus could power the world securely, reliably, affordably, and – crucially – sustainably,' he declares. Gregory is an excellent popular science writer: clear as a bell and gently humorous. If you want to understand the workings of fission or radioactivity, he's your man. But he is also an evangelical pitchman whose chapters on the atom's myriad wonders can read rather like high-end sales brochures. Radiation? Not a problem! Less dangerous, in fact, than radiophobia, 'the irrational fear of radiation'. High-level nuclear waste? It can be buried in impregnable catacombs like Finland's state-of-the-art Onkalo or, better yet, recycled through breeder reactors. Gregory wants the reader to learn to stop worrying and love the reactor. Of course, there is a radioactive elephant in the room, which Gregory eventually confronts in the chapter We Need to Talk About Chernobyl. Like Three Mile Island (1979) and Fukushima (2011), the Soviet disaster caused reactor construction to crash. Europe built more reactors in the five years before Chornobyl than it has in the four decades since. The Fukushima meltdown spooked Germany into dismantling its entire nuclear programme. Whereas France, which has one-eighth of the planet's 441 active reactors, currently generates two-thirds of its electricity from nuclear, Germany produces none, cancelling out its gains from renewables and making it painfully reliant on Russian gas. Gregory argues that the construction of reactors like Hinkley Point C in Somerset runs behind schedule and over budget because we've lost the habit, even as China and South Korea streak ahead. To Gregory, all this is a tragic case of radiophobia. Only around 50 fatalities have been directly attributed to radiation from Chornobyl, while the official death tolls for Fukushima and Three Mile Island are one and zero respectively. Roll them all together and the same number of people are lost roughly every three minutes to air pollution caused by burning fossil fuels. No doubt, the kneejerk rejection of nuclear energy can be ignorant bordering on superstitious, but safety concerns demand more space and consideration. Oddly, Gregory doesn't mention Serhii Plokhy's 2022 book Atoms and Ashes, which explains how the Fukushima disaster could have been much worse if not for the courage and judgment of a few key officials. More offputtingly, he attacks renewable energy with roughly the same arguments used by rightwing critics of net zero, warning of 'energy scarcity, industrial wind-down, and food insecurity' if we choose wind and sun over good old uranium-235. But surely it is not a zero-sum game? After a while, Gregory's relentless boosterism begins to lose its persuasive power and he sounds rather like the blithely confident scientist in the first act of a disaster movie. Even though I'm personally convinced that anybody focused on the climate emergency would be foolish to dismiss nuclear out of hand, I suspect that sceptics may require an argument that sounds a little less like 'Calm down, dear.' Going Nuclear: How the Atom Will Save the World by Tim Gregory is published by Bodley Head (£25). To support the Guardian order your copy at Delivery charges may apply.
Spectator
6 days ago
- Politics
- Spectator
Why going nuclear is humanity's only hope
There are three parties when it comes to global warming. First, the hard right, which says it isn't happening, and even if it is that we can do nothing about it. Then there are the far leftish Luddites who would smash all power generation systems, allowing only wind turbines, wave power etc. Finally there are the suave centrists who know perfectly well that only nuclear can save us. This book will become their bible. Tim Gregory is a nuclear scientist who works at Sellafield. He has a serious problem defending his conviction that nuclear is the answer: radiophobia, the terror people feel about radioactivity. Superficially, this terror seems well-founded. There have been some major nuclear power plant disasters: Three Mile Island, Pennsylvania, in 1979; Chernobyl in the then Soviet Union in 1986; and Fukushima in Japan in 2011. Together they destroyed faith in nuclear as a safe generation system. The industry was stalled and still largely is. This, argues Gregory, is madness. After Fukushima, only one death can be directly related to radiation – a man who died from lung cancer seven years later. The remaining 20,000 casualties were caused by the earthquake and the ensuing tsunami. Even the direct death count from the Chernobyl disaster only amounted to the 'low to mid thirties'. 'That's about the same number of people who die at work in the United Kingdom every three months,' writes Gregory. In contrast, a city of one million people using coal power would suffer 22 deaths per week; using gas would result in two or three deaths per week. Globally, some 8.8 million deaths a year are caused by air pollution.
Telegraph
27-05-2025
- Telegraph
The English high street: Whitehaven, Cumberland – Glorious Georgian houses preserved by poverty
Whitehaven is a town by the sea but not a seaside town. The first designed town in England since the Middle Ages, it was built in the 1660s. Its strong character captivated me in a way no town has for years. Holidaymakers do not flock here but to the Lake District a few miles inland. The train journey from London took six hours via the enjoyably slow line from Carlisle down the coast of Cumberland. It is still open, I suspect, because it serves nearby Sellafield nuclear power station. Sellafield pays good salaries; otherwise, in central Whitehaven, 15 per cent of people are claiming Universal Credit and housing can be poor. Yet the glorious streets of Georgian houses near the harbour were preserved by poverty – the recession from 1800, when the tobacco trade dried up, ensuring that these old houses were not replaced with grand Victorian buildings. The small grid of streets was the brainchild of the local landowner Sir John Lowther, who was in his 20s in the 1660s. He sent detailed instructions to his agent from London, where fellow members of the Royal Society, Sir Christopher Wren and Robert Hooke, were planning the rebuilding of London after the Great Fire of 1666. Whitehaven had 84 households in 1667, 2,281 people by 1696 and 9,063 by 1762. Its greatest prosperity came in the 1740s, from exporting coal mined right by the harbour and importing tobacco, for which this was the main port after London. Coal exports peaked at 400,000 tons in 1928. A new mine was cancelled this year after a court ruling on government net-zero legislation. The principal thoroughfare, Lowther Street, runs from the castle (once the Lowthers' house) to the harbour. Sir John laid out Lowther Street in 1685, 48ft wide. Houses, built by their owners, had to follow a building line on the street with no gaps between them. Windows were to have stone transoms and doors hewn stonework. Sir John refused permission for a back ally to King Street because such things were 'commonly nothing but a sink of nastiness'. The square he built round the new St Nicholas's Church on Lowther Street was the earliest in the country, outside London. From 1706 his son, James, continued the development of fine but modest houses. In modern times many were washed in a variety of colours, adding a fortuitous attraction. During my visit, it was so cold in my lodgings that I went out for a walk in my overcoat in the middle of the night. Unlike London, there were no street sleepers visible, in fact no one at all, and no traffic but a police car. In the moonlight the terraces of Scotch Street and Irish Street looked like theatre sets, their varied 18th-century doorways framed with columns and pediments. From shabby first floor rooms with makeshift curtains came chance nocturnal voices. Of the churches the Lowthers provided, Holy Trinity (1715) was demolished in 1949; St Nicholas (rebuilt 1883) on Lowther Street burned down in 1971, leaving a surprisingly pleasing tower in its green churchyard. The gem is light and tranquil St James's (1753), on the valley side – 'the finest Georgian church interior in the county,' said the great architectural historian Sir Nikolaus Pevsner. In 1970 only 36 per cent of buildings in Whitehaven were sound and 34 per cent derelict. The old industrial area west of the harbour was almost obliterated. Little evidence remains of King Pit, which, in 1793, was the deepest in the world at 160 fathoms, or of Saltom Pit, the first to extend under the sea, in 1729. However, Wellington Lodge survives – a crenellated tower of the 1840s by the architect Sydney Smirke, who was commissioned to design Gothic pithead buildings for the prominent site above the harbour. Whole areas of 18th-century houses were demolished by 1970, when it was realised that if this continued there'd be nothing left. Since then gradual renovation has made the vital difference between a ghost town and an historic setting for local people to develop a future. Lowther Street boasts three rare gems. The first is Michael Moon's shop, which has been 'finding new homes for old books since 1970'. It has 13 rooms and stalagmites of old volumes. Behind the counter I found Peter Moon, wisely wearing a quilted gilet under his tweed jacket against the spring chill and dealing with postal sales. His father Michael kindly walked round from his home to join us. Michael Moon's mind is wryly humorous. His trade flyer lists some things he doesn't sell: 'Donkey stones, tins of dubbin, laminated shims, koi carp, flensing knives, canopic jars…' But not only does he sell books, he publishes them. Of his 55 historical reprints, all sold except for Annals of the Solway by George Neilson (1896). Few live on the Solway Firth who might want to buy it. A few doors down, the flourishing independent Dixons department store occupies a string of old stone houses. (From the slate roof, seagulls dislodge wisps of moss which garnish the pavement.) In many towns a defunct chain department store leaves a gap in the urban dentition. Dixons brings shoppers into the town centre. The third nice surprise was Richardson's wine shop. The model train looping round the 19th-century shop window caught my eye. Then I saw the Whitehaven labelled wine. Surely wine can't be grown here? Gerard Richardson put me right in his little office behind the counter. 'The Whitehaven is a sauvignon blanc from the Marlborough district of New Zealand. They started approximately the same time as our business, 1995, and we have stocked all their vintages.' It sells at £20.95. As supermarkets competed to sell cheaper wine, Richardson went up market. He relishes contrary success. 'We want to be old-fashioned,' he said, nodding at the old coffee-roasting machine. 'We dropped Mondays as a shop day. Trade went up. We closed at 3pm. Trade went up.' Richardson is friendly and unassuming, but served for 19 years as a Justice of the Peace and is a deputy lieutenant of the county. Together with his shop partner, Louise Savage, he has published books on Whitehaven in old photographs. He was behind the Maritime Festivals from 1999 that brought thousands of visitors (the late Queen among them) to the harbour. He kept the festivals going till 2015, when Health & Safety interference made hosting the event a nightmare. Two giant silos on the harbour were demolished in 1992 (formerly used by the popular employer Marchon, which made phosphoric and sulphuric acid). Since 1998 a marina has provided 400 berths for private vessels and a pontoon for commercial craft. I spotted the local fishing vessels Galatea (WA5) and Kinloch (WA35). Since 2022, though, Queen's Marina has turned brown with iron ochre, apparently from water draining a nearby railway tunnel. Some building losses have been shocking. In the 1970s, to make way for a 42,000 sq ft Co-op superstore, one side of the Georgian Church Street and one side of the Georgian Queen Street were demolished for a whole block. Wilkinsons took over from the Co-op; but then closed in 2023. The Post Office in Lowther Street closed in 1994 and in 2020 a huge cannabis farm was discovered in the building. HSBC next door closed in 2022 and NatWest two doors down in 2023. The Methodist Church in Lowther Street remains an attractive feature of the skyline, but it closed in 1996 and last year the interior was mouldering and full of water. Off Lowther Street, King Street, once bustling, now has empty and derelict shops. For weekly shopping most go to Morrisons on one edge of the historic centre, or Tesco, beside the railway station. A strength of Whitehaven is its distinctive culture. I popped into Cross's Coffee Shop ('Estd 1895') in old Roper Street and pointed to a tempting pastry. The cheery waitress looked at me as if I were a Martian, but said, 'Oh, currant cake.' It's a variant of Eccles cake, with no lid. Jane Grigson has a recipe. Further up Roper Street, the 17th century No 54 has been restored, its walls washed a tasteful maroon. But the shop below is empty. Within living memory this was R Brew's clog shop, its window full of wooden shoes. I did see whippets in the town, but no clogs. Whitehaven narrowly escaped the desolation of other post-industrial towns. Its wonderful historic kernel has been rehabilitated only thanks to the commitment of local people in and around Lowther Street.
